


Wash You Away

by thisonegoes



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Dead People, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Epic Friendship, Fear of Death, Ghosts, Graphic Description of Corpses, Halloween, Happy Halloween!, M/M, Past Character Death, Rimming, Sad and Sweet, The Sixth Sense AU, Zayn Malik & Louis Tomlinson Friendship, including mentions of suicide and murder, mentions of bullying, people who died in graphic ways, this story features many ghosts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-08
Updated: 2017-07-14
Packaged: 2018-04-19 02:13:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 58,125
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4728935
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thisonegoes/pseuds/thisonegoes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Harry realized at ten years old that he could see ghosts, when a grown man with dead eyes stepped out of his closet. He’ll never forget that night, when he heard the shuttered doors creak open behind him as he did his homework. He turned around in his desk chair to see the stranger. The man didn’t say anything; he just stared at Harry like Harry had an answer, an explanation, a crumpled road map hidden in his pocket.</p><p>Harry thinks it might be easier, if other people noticed the traces ghosts leave behind. But they never do.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> As I said in the tags, this story is very loosely based on The Sixth Sense. There are mentions of ghosts who died in horrific ways, some wounds/effects of which Harry sees and is frightened by. So if you're not into creepy or graphic stories, just be forewarned. And endless thanks to Jasmine for always holding my hand as I go, especially this time around.
> 
> So there you go, this is my story to lead up to Halloween. I hope you enjoy it. :)

***

 

The lights bounced around his nursery right from the start. Before he even knew how to play, those little balls of vibrant energy, some a blinding white, others a subdued yellow, with just a hint of fuzz around the edges, would dance for him. Anne, like her grandmother before her, used to call them dust bunnies, even though they never stayed along the baseboards for long, swishing with the wind. Instead they skittered near the ceiling, above the crib, peeking out from behind the curtains overlooking the yard. They were playful then, even though Anne hardly remembers them now. They were friendly, if not a little mischievous, like little Lost Boys on their way to Neverland. Innocent. Sweet.

But the lights weren’t reflections bouncing off the surface of a pool or the curve of a wine glass. They weren’t stagnant in their controlled movements. They truly moved freely around her son in the early days, his eyes gleaming as they danced, his hands reaching for them to hold on. The balls of pure energy came and went, quick as anything, in the time it took to tilt a mirror away from the sun, sometimes too fast for Anne to see herself.

As any parent can tell you, as with any child, it was like one day Anne blinked and those moments were gone. It was like one afternoon, her son stopped looking up towards the ceiling to find them. He instead looked down at books, his toys, the cat. The glow faded around the time he turned four, when he started to play with real little boys, instead of with glowing shadows of ones. It was around then that the orbs stopped showing up in photos, stopped showing up at all.

He even forgot that his first word was to say _hello!_ as one settled next to his ear for a good night’s sleep.

For a while, it was like the lights went to dance elsewhere.

The lights didn’t come to play with Harry Styles for a very long time. They left him alone.

For a while.

The next time Harry Styles was visited by a feeling of overwhelming energy, it wasn’t warm or inviting in the form of a burst of white or a warm yellow. He wasn’t four and ready to play with a friend.

It was when he was ten, when a grown man stepped out of Harry’s closet wearing jeans and an orange t-shirt, with half of his face blown off by a shotgun blast.

 

***

 

In visions of the dark night

       I have dreamed of joy departed—

But a waking dream of life and light

       Hath left me broken-hearted.

                        - A Dream, by Edgar Allan Poe

 

***

 

The night presses on as Harry shuffles down Woodland Walk towards his dorm, fingers about ready to fall clean off his hands. The black pea coat looks nice on his frame, but it doesn’t hold heat the way he wishes it would, his hands in fists in the pockets. As his boots slap against the concrete, he senses the shadow behind him and walks faster. He passes the lit up park benches, the study groups coming and going from various campus buildings, and sees the glances. He knows he looks sketchy as hell. He’s the odd-bodied kid with his head down, curls brushing his shoulders, walking with too much of a purpose. Harry rarely ambles or meanders. He walks a straight line, point A to point B, even when he just needs a coffee or a stroll to clear his head. It makes people nervous to watch.

So he continues to stare at his boots.

He hasn’t had a sighting in this park yet, and he’d like to keep it that way. Once a place has been tainted by his cold, hard truth, it’s hard for Harry to enjoy it again. It’s why he hates his bedroom at his mom’s house. And his old block. And his old school. And his current dorm room.

Niall thinks it’s because of the thermostat. He thinks it’s broken, that the drop in temperature night after night in their small shared space is from a glitch in the heater. He sees Harry’s blank stare and pinched expression, and tries to console him with a thick pair of socks and a promise to call their RA. He thinks it’s something normal that can be fixed or resolved. They’re not exactly friends yet, with the semester being so new, but Harry’s pretty sure they could be. He’s never had someone gift him socks before. As he sniffs and gets closer to the other end of the park, he feels bad for being the reason Niall won’t get a good night’s sleep this year.

Maybe Harry should get him a pair of socks to say sorry.

The shadow behind him shifts from his right to his left, as Harry watches the light manipulate from a street lamp as he passes it. This one is fast, faster than most, and in no time at all, Harry feels the hand wrap around his bicep and pull. Harry shakes it though, and runs the last few steps towards the street. It’s no use trying to outrun them, but it’s nice to pretend that the forward momentum gives him a leg up.

As he gets to his destination a few minutes later, Harry quickly glances up towards the massive brick building he now lives in. Each window is illuminated just right, all the college freshman tucked in for the night studying, or eating pizza, or fucking each other’s brains out. Music drifts out of one, a couple fights behind another, a curtain flutters in the cool night air.

He shouldn’t have looked up though, because a body falls from the roof to his right, a kid his age with shaggy hair and bellbottom jeans. His shirt is open, not unlike how Harry wears his own, and his skull hits the concrete with a thud. Harry has to look away, to rush in the front door with his key card between shaking fingers, so that he won’t have to watch it again, the suicide of a student in the late seventies.

They never bleed out, thankfully.

When a ghost relives its last moments, when it gets caught in a time loop to die over and over again, they never bleed like they did when it really happened.

Harry exhales the breath he was holding, once he’s in the stairwell. He savors the last few moments of warmth before he has to step into the icebox he calls home.

 

***

 

Fall in Philadelphia is a sight to behold. It’s as crisp as an apple, as vibrant as a painting, as old as the country itself. Fall in Philly, more than any other season, feels rich and steeped in history, at least for Harry. Each cobblestone in a path, every crack in a sidewalk, even the withered pigeons that land on Benjamin Franklin’s bronze head outside of College Hall, all cohesively make Harry feel like a tadpole in his life cycle. His mom has worked for UPENN for a few years, so he should be used to the feeling by now. It shouldn’t leave him as unsettled as it does, but then again, most things unsettle Harry. A skewed sense of mortality does that to a person.

But the best part about the season for Harry is the fact that Halloween always feels just about a day away, once the leaves turn. Harry’s favorite holiday never barges in like a lion, but seeps into the city’s collective headspace like a lamb, gradually. September hits and the undergrads from the college, Harry’s neighbors in the old neighborhood, the old neighborhoods across the city in general, all somehow decide to start decorating. They grip their scarves and warm their fingers each night, the leaves falling around them like snow, as Halloween inches closer like a creeping animal of prey.

It’s what brings him to the house that night, a few steps behind Niall as he walks up the front steps, the promise of Halloween.

“It’s perfect, right?” Niall claps his hands excitably, boots stomping the old wood of the porch. He raps his knuckles against the front door and waits, bouncing on the balls of his feet.

Harry nods and shoves his hands into his pockets further, the tips of his fingers freezing. Their dorm had been warm, when Harry arrived earlier after class and dinner. Niall said so, laughed a little when he said the temperature fell only when Harry crossed the threshold. If only he knew how true that statement was. A woman sat on Harry’s bed while he tried to laugh with Niall, their breath visible in front of their faces, and stared at him until Harry had to turn away. She was still there when they left, old and gaunt, wearing a nightgown and thin slippers. He heard her mumbling about her husband Philip. She couldn’t find him.

Niall almost caught Harry mumbling himself as he locked the door, “I can’t find him either, sorry,” but he must’ve decided he was hearing things.

Niall knocks on the door of the decrepit Victorian in Spruce Hill a second time, waiting for the telltale sound of footsteps on the other side. This side of town doesn’t sit well with Harry, one of the oldest blocks in the city, full of the shadows Harry tries to keep away. He glances to his left and sees three of them, staring right at him. A young woman with blonde hair, gawking. A dad type, shirtless and barefoot, eyes in slits. The young boy in bellbottoms who Harry saw jump to his death the night before. He’s clearly following Harry until he can pluck up the courage to say something. Some speak to him, some don’t.

“This block is sick,” Niall wipes at his running nose, waiting. “Right? You’re from here, so you’re probably used to it, right? But it’s sick.”

“Yeah,” Harry says as he blinks towards the figures in the next yard over. “Sick.”

“I love Halloween. Love being scared. This is going to be perfect,” Niall nods.

“Me too.”

“Wait, really?” Niall guffaws. “You don’t seem like the… likes-to-be-scared type.”

That’s fair, Harry shrugs. He’s skittish, nervous, on edge most days. His mom used to say that the wind could blow just right and send him into hysterics. She used to pretend like Halloween didn’t exist for awhile, for fear of it freaking Harry out even more than any normal day did.

“I like when people all collectively feel the same emotion at the same time,” Harry nods, as footsteps come closer on the other side of the door. He doesn’t say “because when we’re all scared together, I don’t feel so scared by myself,” but that’s where his brain goes.

Niall tilts his head to think about it, nodding, when the door flies open.

“Hey!” a girl says, grabbing Niall for a hug. “I’m glad you could come over!”

She’s pretty, slightly shorter than Niall, with olive skin and warm brown eyes. Eastern European, maybe. Second generation in the States, a tilt to her vowels Harry finds to be pleasant.

“Hey babe,” Niall smiles.

Harry glances to his left again, to see a fourth has joined the little group in the front yard of another equally massive Victorian monstrosity, as Niall exchanges pleasantries with his new friend from his econ class.

“Harry, this is Sabrina.”

Harry steps around to shake her hand, smiling cordially. He sees the way her eyes widen slightly, at his dimples and skin and general disposition. Maybe she has a friend Harry can meet. If he’s making out with a stranger, he won’t have the headspace to pay attention to the ghosts. Harry could use the distraction. She smooths her hair slightly, and shows them into the house.

“I told Sabrina how bummed I was to not have a house around here,” Niall explains as they remove their coats. “Said it’d be fun to have a Halloween party next month, like I used to at home, and she said she had the perfect place.”

“It’s nice,” Harry nods, peaking around the front entryway, towards a dining room on one side and a living room on the other. Victorians don’t flow from one to the next. Victorians have boxy, square rooms all shoved together haphazardly, a creaking door leading into each new space. Harry’s into open floor plans himself. It makes it easier to look up and see every corner around him, to search for faces hiding or crouching, strangers with dead eyes and knife wounds and holes in their heads, scaring the ever living shit out of him.

He hears Sabrina and Niall walking around the main floor, to chat about the party, as he drifts fully into the living room. Cramped, low ceilings, original wood floors. It’s very much a college party house, with old furniture oddly placed together, old rugs that don’t match, movie posters on the wall in lieu of actual art. It smells faintly of cheap beer and what Harry thinks is nail polish remover, a house full of girls cohabitating with a few guys, clearly. A bong sits on the coffee table, an N64 controller next to it, an old issue of Cosmo.

“Are you friends from home?” he hears Sabrina whisper from a room over.

“We’re… new friends. Roommates. But he’s cool.”

“He’s quiet.”

“Yeah… quiet.”

Harry glances out the window and sees a few more have joined the group. He swallows and focuses on the far wall, a few more posters there, pictures tacked to a pink message board. Girls love that kind of shit, don’t they.

It’s as Niall and Sabrina head upstairs that Harry sighs and sits on the couch. If Sabrina’s giggle and “let me show you my room” are anything to go by, they’ll be fucking before Harry can fully regret coming in the first place.

It’s just that the woman in his dorm room wouldn’t have left for ages. They never leave when they’re confused like that. She won’t understand that Harry can’t answer her, or why she’s even there. It’s like they find Harry, somehow, something leading them to him, but they don’t know how or why.

And when they can’t understand why they’re in Harry’s presence, sometimes they get angry. Sometimes they get so sad, they just cry for hours in his closet or under his bed. So really, coming along with Niall was better than being half-alone.

“Sab!” a man’s voice calls from the front porch.

Harry rubs his palms against his jeans and waits on the couch, ready for a stranger to waltz in the door. For the strangers who could waltz in right behind him.

But the stranger walks in the house alone. He’s beautiful, Harry nods to himself, almost familiar somehow, with black hair and almond eyes. He kicks off his boots and sets down a heavy backpack, calling for Sabrina a few more times, before his eyes befall Harry sitting in the room to his left.

Harry holds up an awkward hand.

“Hey,” the guy nods to him, tugging his jacket off his arm.

“Hi.”

“Which one of them are you here with?” the guy gestures to the stairs, to the house’s massive second floor where any number of students could be living.

“Sabrina.”

“So she _is_ home.”

“Yeah.”

“Is that guy with her?” the stranger smiles knowingly, stepping into the living room fully. Harry gets a good view of his lower stomach, as he stretches his arms over his head, his shoulders probably sore from the bag he carried all the way home. Harry also notices, with a small smile on his face, that the guy’s jeans fit him perfectly in the front.

Harry catches himself staring at the guy’s dick, so he hurries to look towards the front window. It’s a huge pane of glass, completely uncovered, no blinds or curtains, which is honestly Harry’s worst nightmare. If he can see out, it means they can see in, and sure enough, a face peeks out around the corner of the porch. Harry’s heart jumps so hard in his chest, he coughs on a breath. The adrenaline surge never fails to surprise him, when one catches him off guard.

He swallows the lump in his throat and sees the guy sit across from him in a beat up old armchair, frowning. Harry’s been caught, as the guy looks over his shoulder out the window, probably expecting to see a murderer. But to this stranger, the porch is empty. Silent and still, just creepy because we’ve been conditioned to find old houses intrinsically creepy.

The guy shakes it off, must think Harry imagined something, as his body language eases up. He leans back and eyes Harry, smirking slightly, and Harry can tell he likes what he sees. He’s about to look up from his hands in his lap, to slap on some confidence, to maybe make out with the stranger instead of looking out the window, when the realization hits him.

His eyes snap up and suddenly it’s clear.

“I’m Zayn,” the guy smiles, thinking Harry’s sudden attention means he’s interested. He juts his chin for Harry to reveal his own name, to play the game.

Zayn Malik. It’s Zayn Malik there in Sabrina’s living room. He looks the same and different. It hits all of Harry’s senses at once, the smile and smirk, the curve of his jaw more defined, but still as nice as Harry remembers it. It’s the same Zayn Malik from St. Anthony’s Academy For Boys, the school Harry attended for only one year. Fifth grade. One of Harry’s worst years.

It’s when he had his incident. The very worst one.

The incident Zayn Malik had a front row seat to.

“I’m Harry,” he stares at Zayn, dropping his chin slightly, willing Zayn to remember him. _You better fucking remember me, you prick._

“I like that name,” Zayn smiles, leaning forward on his elbows.

Harry glances over Zayn’s shoulder towards the front window. He’s stepped fully up to the glass now, no longer wondering if Harry can see him. He’s already angry, confused, now that he knows Harry definitely can. He points to his chest, he’s mouthing it, _can you see me, I know you can, come out here, or I’m coming in._ Harry’s heart thuds in his chest. He’s older, but not by much. Harry can’t see a wound or an obvious reason for his death, so it must’ve been sudden. An illness they never caught. An aneurysm in his sleep. One too many sleeping pills after a hard day. He’s handsome. Probably had a wife. Maybe a kid. He’s fucking pissed. He doesn’t think he should be here.

He’s probably strong. And if Harry won’t answer him, he could do damage.

“So your friend is the one Sab won’t shut up about, right? The blonde one with the straight teeth and cute laugh?” Zayn smiles, trying to get Harry’s attention again.

“Yeah.”

The man slaps his chest over and over, thinking it’ll help start his heart up again. It’s distracting as always, a ghost having a meltdown before his very eyes, not that Harry wants to focus on Zayn Malik especially hard. Because Zayn doesn’t know him, hasn’t recognized him one bit. He’s trying to chat like it’s nothing, like he didn’t watch those boys scar Harry for life.

Zayn tries a few more times, to make conversation, but Harry stares over him at the man on the porch. He’s so confused. He’s hurt. He’s scared. He’s going to want to take it out on him, Harry knows it.

“Alright well,” Zayn nods awkwardly, giving up, making like he’s going to stand up. “I should… I’m gonna go to my room.”

“Okay.”

“Yeah, okay,” Zayn eyes him, like a truly fragile person has entered his house and he’s not sure if he should leave him alone. He glances at Harry like he wants to offer him some warm milk, or a nice pillow to rest his head.

Just as Zayn fully stands, his entire body blocks Harry’s view of the man on the other side of the glass. Without the visual, without the presence of sound, Harry could probably pretend like the ghost on the porch went away. He could close his eyes so that when Zayn moved, he’d never have to see the man again. He could probably ask for that warm milk or pillow.

But that doesn’t go over well, because the man loses it. Harry can’t hear the screaming and obscenities, but he can see them leaving his mouth. Zayn heads towards the hall, right as Harry watches the man slam his palm against the glass to get Harry’s attention.

The entire window shakes with the force of it, a dull _thump_ Harry feels in his gut, in his bones, his brain rattling in his skull. Zayn jumps and whips his head towards the window, the sound practically echoing around them.

“What the _fuck_ was that?” he runs to the window to press his nose to it, searching the porch for someone, or an animal, whatever hit the window. “Did you see anyone? Where did they go?”

Harry runs his hands over his face, his fingers shaking, before he wobbles to his feet.

“Tell Niall I left.”

“What?” Zayn calls after him as he makes his way to the door.

“I gotta go.”

“You – ” Zayn follows, as his shoulders bounce, at a loss for words, concerned and scared. For Harry. He must know something spooked him. He heard the thud on the window just like Harry did, because ghosts are real and they can make themselves known. If they try hard enough.

Harry can’t handle concern from Zayn Malik, or answer any of his questions. He can’t look at him any longer.

He gets off the porch as fast as he can, without glancing towards the man. He takes the wooden stairs two at a time, his feet unsteady, his ankles weak in his boots. He runs back towards campus, crossing himself, praying with all his might that the group doesn’t follow him, that the man loses him entirely and grieves for himself elsewhere.

He prays the woman in his room found her Philip, so he can be alone when he’s supposed to be alone.

 

***

 

The scariest thing Harry ever saw was an old episode of “The Twilight Zone,” that to this day if he thinks about it, still makes his heart race and palms sweat. That’s saying something, seeing as how Harry realized at ten years old that he could see dead people when a grown man stepped out of his closet. He’ll never forget that night, when he heard the shuttered doors creak open behind him as he did his homework. He turned around in his desk chair to see the stranger. He didn’t say anything; he just stared at Harry like Harry had an answer, an explanation, a crumpled road map hidden in his pocket.

Harry wet himself that night, as he ran into his mother’s room, screaming about the stranger. She searched the house and didn’t find anyone, assured him he must’ve been dreaming. He went to sleep that night, and every night since, with the man’s stare burned into his eyelids.

But on the whole, the scariest experience of them all was that “Twilight Zone” episode. He remembers it distinctly, not just the episode itself, but the blanket he had over his head like a cape as he watched it one night alone. He can still taste the popcorn he made on the stove all by himself. He was thirteen by then, well aware of his gift, his _curse_ more like, but he resolved to face it. He kept his head down so he wouldn’t have to see them, he ran from his room if one showed up uninvited, he kept to himself so he wouldn’t make the mistake of befriending one on the playground, thinking it was a real, live person. Not again.

So even when he should’ve been scared to be alone that night when Anne went on a second date with some guy named Trevor, he tried not to be. His mom couldn’t afford to send him to any more therapy sessions and she worried every time he brought up the strange people who followed him around. He had read up on it, and others like him said it was dangerous to say it out loud too many times. They put those kinds of people away in hospitals, in padded rooms with plastic cups of pills and shoes without laces. Harry didn’t want to be sent away.

Especially after the incident in the crawl space, he knew. After the boys from school locked him up inside it, he knew if he told people what really happened inside it, he’d be off in a cell somewhere. And his mom would have to be alone.

So he resolved to watch scary movies, read ghost stories, bought “Goosebumps” books. Because if he could be scared of what other people were scared of, he didn’t have to feel like a freak. Because if he finished the movie, or the book, if he turned off the TV or slammed the back cover shut, it would be over. An ending. A calm after a storm.

Harry wanted an ending of his own. It was the best he could do.

So he thought it would be okay, to watch the old black and white episode alone, like a grown up, brave and proud.

He was wrong. It’s haunted him ever since.

It was one of the show’s first episodes, from 1958 so said the TV Guide. It was Henry’s story, a loner who didn’t navigate the world too well. He didn’t enjoy people much. He enjoyed books more. He enjoyed solitude, tucked away with his inked friends on musky paper, well away from his nagging wife and overbearing boss at the bank he worked for.

One day, when Henry went into the basement of the bank to have his lunch alone, he glanced at a newspaper headline that said an atomic bomb may be on its way. Seconds later, the ground shook, the walls started to crumble, he was knocked out. Henry eventually came to and emerged from the underground steel vault to see that the world as he knew it was destroyed. Everyone was dead and gone, the city he grew up in sat completely in ruin around him. Nuclear war had destroyed the earth. Henry survived by being in the vault. Just Henry.

He panicked and briefly considered suicide, when he discovered a revolver. But then the clouds shifted and he looked up to see his library, full of books, right in front of him. The books survived. His paper friends didn’t let him down after all. They never do. He could live with them forever.

Henry realized he was finally alone. It was his blessing. He had all the time in the world now. He smiled.

Right as he bent down to pick up the first book of many, he stumbled and his glasses fell right off his face. They shattered. In shock, he picked up the broken remains of the glasses he was virtually blind without and said, “That’s not fair. That’s not fair at all. There was time now. There was – was all the time I needed. It’s not fair! It’s not fair!”

Henry burst into tears, surrounded by the books he’d never be able to read.

The End.

At thirteen, Harry should’ve known not all stories end the way you want them to. He’d see movies that ended on cliffhangers or with the killer getting away. He had books where the bad guys won, where the heroes lose, and it sucked, sometimes. But it was the first time a story had ever gutted him on a visceral level, showing him that some stories end with the main character forever and irreversibly alone.

It terrified Harry more than anything ever had, because he already knew what it meant to be alone. Truly alone. Harry didn’t need a bomb to drop. He had a world full of people around him. He had his mom and his room, his space that he decorated with church candles because the heat helped combat the constant cold.

But he was alone. He wandered from place to place, still with a purpose, but unsure of his surroundings. He felt like a ghost, too. He felt like them. They followed him, pushed him, tugged his hair when he covered his eyes, screamed in his face even when he cried, like it was a dream, like it was _his_ fault he wouldn’t wake up from it. Like it was his fault they were dead.

Harry cried as the credits rolled, because he was like Henry. There was no ending in sight, no through line to his story. It was just going to be like this, this life full of real life scary stories and souls out to hurt him, forever.

It wasn’t fair.

That’s what Harry thinks about as he runs back to his dorm that night, the old “Twilight Zone” episode he’s never forgotten. He remembers the blanket and the popcorn, as his boots catch on cobblestones in the park. He remembers Henry and his glasses, and as he wipes his running nose in the stairwell leading to his room, he has to catch himself from falling.

Harry tears into his room to discover the old woman has left, that he’s by himself. The relief surges through his veins at an alarming speed as he collapses onto his bed. The heater kicks in and he feels the warmth travel up his toes first, a beautiful sensation he rarely gets to appreciate. His doctors have told him he just has “poor circulation” and to bundle up more. They told him early on to stop complaining about being cold.

He drifts off thinking about the man on Zayn’s porch, the face he made when he begged Harry, with his anger, to give him an answer. He was like Henry now too, Harry supposes. Maybe they all were, Harry and his ghosts.

Harry thankfully drops off into a deep sleep right as he remembers the palm print his hand left on the glass. Zayn didn’t see it, but Harry did. He thinks it might be easier, if other people noticed the traces ghosts leave behind.

But they never do.

 

***

 

Harry loves a good distraction. He always has. When something overwhelms him, or sends his anxiety through the roof, he’ll latch to whatever he can to not think about it. It’s why he had such good grades in school, despite his lack of sleep and low vitamin levels. He studied hard, he read every book assigned to him, and he never complained when he had to do extra credit.

So for the next two weeks after that night in Spruce Hill, Harry keeps his head down. He’s still new to UPENN, still an undeclared first-semester freshman, but he can study the basics. He goes to his English, Psychology, and European History classes. He reads until his head hurts, tucked at his desk in his dorm room. Niall brings him food every so often, which he’s grateful for, since he sometimes forgets to function when truly distracting himself.

He visits his mom at work, in the UPENN admissions office. He tells her he’s doing just fine, the lie he’s been telling her for almost ten years. He goes for runs, which he’s enjoyed since middle school when he joined the track team. He knows he can’t outrun the shadows, but it still helps when he needs to pretend like he can. He starts tracking his miles and times on his phone, to see how fast he can get. He’s hoping for his old four-minute mile by Christmas.

He resolutely does not think about Zayn Malik, or the crawl space, or the worst loop a ghost has ever caught him in. He doesn’t think about any of it. Not at all.

He studies, eats, runs, and keeps his eyes down. He flirts with a girl in the park, he smirks at a boy in the library, and he ignores the cold spots wherever he walks.

Niall asks Harry one night if he’d like to go to a party down the hall, in some guy’s room from Jersey. He said a bunch of girls were going, even a few boys, something like, “if you’re into that, I don’t know, you seem… not that I assume anything about anyone, but if you – I don’t know, maybe you like guys too, they could be there?”

Harry politely declined with a smile and a hug. He made sure to say thank you as he held Niall against his chest, and not just for the invite. Because Niall hasn’t complained about the icy temperature in their room, or Harry’s penchant for sleeping upright at his desk with a lamp on. And that more than anything, Niall’s willingness to see Harry as a person who is the way he is, makes Niall his absolute best friend. Even if he doesn’t know it yet. Even if he decides not to agree to it.

“You can talk to me, you know,” Niall says one night as he heads out, running fingers through his dirty blonde hair.

“I know.”

“And you know, if you ever… like need to get drunk. Or laid. Or whatever, to get through the day, just let me know.”

Harry smiled at Niall from his desk, pushing his hair away from his face. He tried drinking in high school, but it didn’t do him any favors. His entire life feels like an acid trip, a lucid dream he can’t wake up from, a two a.m. binge with bile in his throat. Drinking isn’t for him; it doesn’t quiet the noise in his head. And he can get laid just fine, if he so chooses. He can connect with human beings, sometimes. He didn’t win all his high school awards by sitting at a desk like a chump; he’s smart of course, but he also knows how to work his angles.

“I’ll be good,” Harry nodded.

“Good. Because I need you rested and ready for the Halloween party in a few weeks. I want you there, and I want you messy as hell, Harry Styles,” Niall finished with a wink as he left the room.

The ghosts don’t follow Harry as much when he’s focused, or that’s what he tells himself. So over those two weeks, Harry had only seen one. A little girl stood outside the coffee shop he had a latte in the weekend before, foam smeared across his lip. He looked up and saw her staring at him, people swishing past her in their coats and scarves. Adults don’t ignore little girls standing in the cold on their own, so Harry knew right away she came for him. He never knows exactly what to do when young ones find him, so he waved awkwardly. He shrugged his shoulders, not sure if she wanted to say anything, but she ran away.

Over the years, Harry has found that sometimes the ghosts just need to find him, to assure themselves that the real world has continued spinning without them. If Harry can see them, the weird kid who can’t help one bit, the one they’re inexplicably drawn to, it means they really did die. And it’s really time to move on.

Sometimes that’s all they need. But when it’s not, when they need more, that’s when Harry gets most worried. It’s like the man from Zayn’s porch, or the ones who come into his room uninvited. They can be the angry ones, the ones who can touch Harry if they want to. They suck the energy from the room, drop the temperature, move the hair along Harry’s neck with their words. They’re the ones who pound on glass, open doors, and turn on faucets so Harry knows he’s not alone. They scare him. Sometimes on purpose.

So after Niall leaves that night, a few hours later, Harry knows it’s about to happen when he sees his breath. He’s leaning over his English book with a highlighter in hand, when suddenly his exhales turn to mist. Cold as ice. The goose bumps erupt along his forearms, footsteps behind him.

Harry isn’t alone anymore. And he’s been doing so well.

“Hello,” he says quietly, eyes boring into the pages beneath his palms. He doesn’t want to turn around.

“You’re really very pretty,” she says with a sigh.

“Thank you.”

“Do you get told that often?”

“Sometimes.”

“I think I used to be pretty.”

Harry shuts his eyes with a snap. She’s walking forward, he can feel the air around her. It’s cold. It’s swirling around him.

“I’m sure you were,” he nods, tongue thick.

“You haven’t even looked at me, love.”

“I don’t want to, thank you.”

“Why not?”

Harry doesn’t answer because he doesn’t want to say “because you could look like every childhood nightmare I’ve ever had.” He doesn’t answer because he doesn’t like to talk to them. He ignores them, that’s what he does. The boys who throw themselves off roofs, who died on purpose, they don’t need him. The confused ones who don’t know they’re dead, he just runs the other way. The ones who congregate in groups to stare at him, the angry ones in old schools and crawl spaces and pubs, the ones who grip him by the throat and won’t let go, he doesn’t want to hear what they have to say.

He distracts himself. He wants her to leave. He doesn’t want to get caught in a loop, not tonight.

The ones who come like this, the smart ones who know they’re dead, who know Harry, they either loop, or want to chat like it’s a goddamn scene in a movie. Harry almost raises his hands to cover his ears, in case she’s about to start talking to Harry like he’s her killer, or abusive husband, or the drunken sorority girl who hit her with a car. He’s had people scream in his face about his choices, the hurt he’s caused, the accidents he should’ve prevented. He winces. He really almost covers his ears, but that had been his mistake once. He had a welt on his back for weeks afterwards.

“That other boy from before seemed nice. Is he nice like you?” she steps closer, voice in a whisper, inquiring like a teacher would. She must sense his discomfort, because her voice is soft. Nice and comforting, like his mom or grandma before her.

“Yes.”

“Good. You need a friend, don’t you.”

Harry pinches his bottom lip, his hand shaking. He still hasn’t opened his eyes.

“I need to study now,” he whispers. “Thank you for the visit. I hope you have a nice night.”

“You’re polite.”

“Thank you.”

“My son was polite. He had your eyes as well.”

She touches his cheek with one cold finger, sending a chill down his spine, a sigh to her voice now. All Harry catches when he opens his eyes is the quick flash of fabric near his feet, the sweeping of a long skirt as she goes.

He stays up until four in the morning. He reads four more chapters than he needs to, and an extra article about the book online, before finishing out with the footnotes and a blog post from the author.

Distractions are Harry’s only options some nights.

 

***

 

The best part about college, so far, has been the sugar. Harry didn’t eat much of it as a kid, with Anne being strict over his sugar intake, so now that he can eat it whenever he wants, he takes advantage. He finds himself looking through the candy aisle of every store he walks into. The Halloween candy is so easy to buy in bulk, huge bags of it he gorges on for all hours of the night as he studies with Niall by his side. His eyes always sweep the bakery counter at the coffee shop right off campus, he licks icing from his fingers almost daily, he sucks on Hershey’s kisses instead of mints.

Zayn approaches him a few days later, at the ice cream parlor he found one night during a run. Harry has headphones in, an old Wes Craven documentary playing on his phone, when he feels the tap on his back.

Instinctively, Harry tears his body away from the pressure. His head whips up, his ice cream tips over on its side, his face white as snow. But it’s just Zayn Malik, with his beautiful face and clean-cut fingernails and pierced nose. He holds his hands up in surrender, scared of Harry’s sudden movement.

“Hey. Harry, right? Sab’s friend?”

“Hi.”

“It’s a bit cold for ice cream, isn’t it?” Zayn raises an eyebrow at the dish of rocky road in front of Harry, his fingers sticky as he tries to clean the mess.

“It’s never too cold for ice cream.”

“It’s October.”

“It’s ice cream,” Harry stares at him.

Zayn chuckles as he sits next to Harry, presumptuously and uninvited. It’s apparently not too cold for Zayn either, as he swipes a finger into Harry’s goddamn ice cream and sucks on it. His eyes sparkle and Harry pretends not to notice the innuendo behind it.

“Did you need something?”

“I saw you through the window. Just wanted to say hi,” Zayn shrugs.

“Oh. Okay.”

“Are you always this awkward?”

“Are you always this rude?”

“Oh, so I’m rude for wanting to say hi?” Zayn slaps a hand to chest, mock offended.

Harry stands to discard his melted ice cream and pulls on his jacket. It’s not until he’s grabbed his bag and walking back towards his dorm that Zayn catches up to him. Their strides match.

Harry’s gotten closer to Niall since that night at Sabrina’s house, and he more or less told him the bare minimum: _Zayn and I knew each other as kids. He was mean. That’s it._ Niall frowned at it, at the small morsel Harry chose to share with him, but clapped him on the shoulder. They saw Zayn the day before in the English building, and Niall flipped him off behind his back. Harry almost held his hand for it, but thought it might be too much.

“You look familiar,” Zayn finally says, eying Harry sideways with a half-smile.

_Well I should fucking hope so, asshole._

“I must have that kind of face,” Harry says instead, eyes forward.

“Are you sure we don’t know each other from somewhere?”

“Are you?”

“Do you always answer questions with a question?” Zayn knocks their hips together playfully.

“When I don’t want to answer a question, then yes.”

Zayn waves to a few people the closer they get to Harry’s dorm, the lights along the sidewalk leading their way. Harry’s not sure why he hasn’t told Zayn to leave him alone yet, and he’s pretty sure it’s just because he’s so fucking attractive, he actually likes the jealous looks he receives from a few guys as they go. Harry sort of hates himself for that, but Zayn has always been good looking enough to attract a certain amount of attention. He even gets a hug from some random girl from his high school, which Harry doesn’t stop and wait for. He walks in his straight line towards home, and Zayn has to jog to catch up to him, his cheeks pink.

They get to the dorm steps a few minutes later, right as Harry catches the eye of two men to his right, staring at him.

“So are you gonna invite me up?” Zayn leans in, lips at Harry’s ear, voice husky and as inviting as smooth velvet.

“What?” Harry tears his eyes away from the men, to stare at Zayn. “Why would I invite you up?”

“I figured this could be our thing,” Zayn smiles at him, scrunching his nose slightly. “You pretend to hate me, and I pretend to annoy you, and then we fuck like we’re mad about it.”

He wiggles his eyebrows playfully.

Harry almost tells Zayn Malik to go fuck himself. He almost says, “Hey remember that day at Marcus McCusker’s house, when you watched three boys lock me in a crawl space in the attic for twenty minutes? Remember how I screamed and cried for them to let me out? And you just stood there, frowning and crying with your hands in fists, but quiet as a fucking mouse?”

Harry opens his mouth and everything, when he hears it.

“Hey!”

“You!”

Harry squirms then, his entire body reacting to the voices. They start walking towards him, brothers most likely, in blue jeans and oversized t-shirts, their beer bellies hanging over their belts. Strong. Football dads hell-bent on their sons getting to state. Tractor salesmen from Iowa, maybe. Mean. Angry drunks. Fingers pointing at Harry like he’s about to get his ass whooped good.

Harry swallows hard, the bile rising. He can feel the ice cream churning in his belly like battery acid.

“Yeah, come up,” he nods, finally turning back to Zayn to grip his wrist. “Come on.”

“Holy shit, it worked,” Zayn mutters under his breath with a grin, so quiet he probably didn’t think Harry heard.

But Harry did, because he always does.

 

***

 

Even if Harry still harbors resentment towards Zayn, he can’t help but be polite as he takes his coat and scarf, to drape them over the hook on his closet door. He turns the heat up a tad, even though the room isn’t as chilly as it normally is when Harry crosses the threshold. Zayn makes himself at home, lays right on Harry’s bed like he owns the place, as Harry settles at his desk. Zayn makes a comment about the large pumpkins near the TV, the ones Harry bought but hasn’t carved yet. He needs a better knife, and a few good ideas first. Harry murmurs that you can’t just start carving a pumpkin willy-nilly. It’s a specific process.

Zayn giggles and it’s the most attractive thing Harry’s heard from him yet.

Harry keeps his eyes down to remove his boots and socks, but as always, he can sense the pair of eyes on him. He can also sense something else, an energy he can’t put his finger on just yet, but something. It hovers over Zayn’s shoulder, a spec, barely a flicker. But it’s there.

“So now what?” Zayn smiles, kicking his own boots off.

“I’m not fucking you,” Harry sighs, turning towards his desk.

“Oh. I – well, okay.”

“Okay?” Harry hears himself ask.

“I’d love to just kiss you first, to be honest. But whatever, if you don’t want to, maybe another night. We can talk, or just sit here. If you’re going to be all awkward about it,” Zayn ends with a smile. “Movie?”

He’s not trying to be rude about it, Harry can tell. He’s being a gentleman, even after Harry invited him up to his goddamn room like a neon-light invitation, like he wanted Zayn’s dick in his ass.

But Harry doesn’t want to like Zayn, or his face, or his mouth, or anything about him, not after what Zayn saw. Not after he let it happen. Not after he forgot Harry Styles ever even existed. So Harry pulls his laptop closer to queue up Netflix, to give them something tangible to focus on, before Zayn decides he’s bored of Harry and leaves. Harry just doesn’t want to be alone at the moment, not that he’d ever admit it, and the men down on the grass are probably waiting for him. They’re the type to wait for Harry to be alone, so they can yell and leave marks.

Before he knows it’s happening, Zayn’s up and off his bed, standing behind Harry at the desk. He smells fucking delicious, like a ripe pear mixed with something else, something heavenly. Harry’s eyes droop slightly, as he inhales. His fingers lose their place on the keyboard.

“What should we watch?” Zayn asks, leaning in.

“Whatever.”

“Do you like scary movies? In that Halloween mood yet?” Zayn grips Harry by the shoulders, fingers digging in slightly. It feels like nothing Harry’s ever felt before, as he relaxes into it. He starts to feel a buzz under his skin, his hands and feet suddenly vibrating. He feels that energy again, the one he couldn’t place. It’s hovering right next to them.

“Yeah,” Harry’s head drops, his chin to his chest, as Zayn massages his muscles further. Deeper.

“Really? Didn’t think you would.”

“So I hear.”

Zayn laughs and Harry swears he feels that in his core, near his stomach, tucked back against his spine.

Suddenly Harry’s mind gets doused in water, like a bucket’s been overturned above his head. His eyes snap open, his entire body engages, as if he’s about to fall into a loop. But it’s impossible, there isn’t a ghost in the room, he’s not being taken to someplace else, someplace foreign he can’t get out of. He’s just with Zayn, and Zayn is definitely alive and real and not a figment of Harry’s imagination. He’s alive alive alive, he’s warm, Harry knows it.

“You okay?” Zayn whispers, worried. He must feel Harry’s body rejecting his touch.

But Harry won’t let him back up, he can’t. He hurries to grab Zayn’s hands, to keep them on his shoulders, to feel the heat he brings. Zayn runs hot. There’s something right there that Harry’s supposed to pay attention to, so he holds on. Zayn grips him harder, to say he’s okay.

She’s in the room with them, Safaa. Harry feels her name inside of his skull, doesn’t even need to hear it out loud. He just knows. She’s right there over Zayn’s shoulder, a sparkler on the Fourth of July, the dancing light on the surface of a pond. A dust bunny. She’s not a fully formed one, not a ghost by the standard definition, but Harry knows she’s smiling. She’s not as cold as the rest, she’s so sweet and young. So fucking young, so innocent she can’t be more than a few years old. But she’s happy. She’s so happy to be with Zayn, to be close to him.

Harry almost starts to cry.

“Harry, are you okay? What’s wrong? Breathe,” Zayn moves to the right, to crouch down on his haunches, eyes pained.

Harry finally looks down at him, and realizes their hands are still clasped tight, in his lap now. Zayn is so warm, so deliciously warm, Harry doesn’t want to let go. He stares at Zayn and can’t understand what’s happening, this pull to be closer, to crawl into Zayn’s lap and never leave. He wants to tell Zayn all his secrets, he wants to know who Safaa was, who she is, why Zayn makes her so happy. He wants Zayn Malik, even though Zayn Malik let him loop in that crawl space.

“I’m okay,” Harry says, swallowing the lump in this throat, pointing to his chest. “I… I have asthma and sometimes it… I just lose my head for a few seconds, that’s all. I’m okay.”

“You’re okay,” Zayn nods in return, even though his face can’t hide the fact that he doesn’t believe the asthma story one bit. He stares at Harry with concern, no longer the sultry flirt from the shitty Victorian, the sex god who said he wanted to fuck around. He’s like a tether then, a slice of the sun itself. A lifeline. To Zayn, Harry is a stranger, just some guy he randomly met in his own living room, and now he’s here, holding on so Harry doesn’t drown.

“Yeah,” Harry inhales and exhales slowly.

“You wanna watch that movie now? How about something funny instead?”

“Yes,” Harry nods, standing up, their bodies closer than ever.

“Okay,” Zayn nods back, eyes full. He holds Harry’s hands tighter, before leaning in to kiss his cheek, just once.

As they settle on Harry’s bed with his laptop and one of Zayn’s favorite movies, Harry keeps close. He didn’t know until that moment that he could ever be that close to anyone, let alone Zayn, but Zayn lets him. They both instinctually know that Harry needs this, whatever this is. Harry decides Zayn can’t be so bad after all, not anymore, not when he kisses Harry’s forehead like they’ve been together for years.

They crowd together with their feet intertwined, and Harry’s pretty sure Safaa knows what the movie is, because he can hear her laughing along whenever Zayn does.

 

 

***

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

***

 

Zayn Malik is a great distraction.

Harry is thankful again to be in college, in this new place, because it lends itself well to this kind of distraction. Harry doesn’t have to ask his mom’s permission for Zayn to come over, he doesn’t feel weird about Zayn sleeping in his bed because his own house is “too busy,” and they can stay up until five in the morning whenever they feel like it. They share bags of orange and black Hershey’s kisses every night over that following week after their movie night, their ankles crossed side by side as they study, read books, and marathon “Friday Night Lights.”

They don’t kiss. Or fuck. Harry senses whenever Zayn wants to lean in, feels the brief touches to his hand when they get quiet, the way Zayn’s eyes go wide and hopeful when Harry smiles at him just so. But Harry always turns away.

He’s not sure why Zayn keeps coming back, to be honest. Harry doesn’t find himself to be especially exciting. He’s not very funny, he tends to lose his train of thought when ghosts whisper behind bookshelves, and he doesn’t put out. He doesn’t even hold Zayn’s hand out in public, even when Zayn tries a few times.

Zayn doesn’t seem bothered, though. He must be like Harry: clinging to someone because it’s all so new, this new life, with all these strangers. He’s trying to find a place to belong, like every other freshman kicking leaves across campus. He shows up at Harry’s door with candy and ice cream almost every day after classes. He laughs at Harry’s lame jokes, he grips Harry’s shoulder when he disappears for a few seconds here and there, and he texts Harry even when he’s supposed to be paying attention to professors.

He also talks a lot. He used to come off as the shy type, back in the fifth grade. But Harry has certainly changed since then, like most adults do, so it can hardly be a surprise that the small, shy kid from St. Anthony’s turned out to be so sure of himself and the space he inhabits. He tells Harry about his views on politics. They discuss the relevance of Chaucer and the genius of Deepak Chopra. Zayn shows Harry how to pry open the old, wooden windows in his room, so he can blow cigarette smoke out at all hours of the night when they get into the free market and world peace. Harry hasn’t had a friend in a long time, especially one he holds hands with some nights and cuddles next to, and definitely not one who always wants to know what’s on his mind.

That’s what Zayn does, Harry realizes. They’re not together, they don’t touch each others’ dicks or say how they feel. But you wouldn’t know it, with how often Zayn checks in on him. He constantly asks Harry how he’s feeling, where he’s gone off to when his gaze wanders, if he’s feeling all right. He brings Harry tea and even feels his forehead a few times. He tries to get Harry to double up on socks, when his toes go numb from the cold.

Harry tells Zayn about his mom and his favorite crime novels. Zayn explains how to figure out the interest rate on the credit card Harry was offered by a recruiter outside of the library. He practically smacks Harry across the face as he cries from laughing, since Harry already signed up for it. “You’ll be paying it off until you’re thirty!” He throws a Rolo at Harry’s face when he laughs harder.

Harry laughs so hard sometimes when they’re together, he forgets to be scared. He forgets to notice the shadows, even the ones who suck all the air out of his lungs. Harry just coughs. “Asthma.” And then it’s back to laughing.

They carve pumpkins on the dorm floor, side by side in their mounds of layered clothing. Zayn bites his tongue as he works the knife through the top of his, and Harry has to bite his own, to stop himself from thinking about it too hard. They’re just friends, Harry reminds himself time and time again. He likes having a friend too much to fuck it up.

Harry carves his pumpkin into a vampire, with the help of a detailed stencil he found online. Zayn carves his into Harry, with wide eyes and curls around his chin. They take pictures of Harry and the pumpkin side by side. Harry sends it to his mom and hopes she takes it as a good sign.

It’s damn near perfect, even when the temperature drops to arctic temperatures every night, and they have to sleep in Harry’s small bed together in a perfect four-shape. Because even when it’s fucking freezing and Harry shakes in his arms, Zayn never complains.

 

***

 

Zayn doesn’t complain about the cold, but he recognizes how ridiculous it is to live in it. He’s clearly seen Harry attempt to huff warm air into his hands one too many times, so he brings a screwdriver one Thursday night, to see if he can fix the fucking thermostat once and for all.

Unlike Niall, who learned to ignore the chill to their room, Zayn seems to think he can fix it. Niall still won’t speak to Zayn without an edge to his voice, even after Harry whispered that it was fine. Niall swore Zayn didn’t bother him, and swore harder that he didn’t mind Zayn sleeping over. But Harry noticed that he slept on his friend Liam’s futon down the hall all week. Harry suspects it’s so he doesn’t snap at Zayn for being a brat to Harry as a kid, not that Zayn would even remember it. Harry sees Zayn frown a few times, at being so openly disliked, but he doesn’t say anything.

It’s as Zayn tries to fix the thermostat that one visits, yet again, for the third time in as many days. They’re both shivering from the cold, breaths visible. Harry almost runs out the door, to escape it entirely. Zayn is supposed to be his distraction, his slice of the sun, his new… friend, or whatever they are. He doesn’t want Zayn there as it happens.

But it’s too late.

“I just think,” Zayn squints one eye as he pokes the wires behind the little circular dial near Harry’s closet, “that if I connect something that’s come disconnected, maybe we can get the heat to work.”

“Maybe,” Harry shrugs quietly from his bed, sat straight up, stiff as a board, feet on the floor. Zayn works with his back to him, so he doesn’t notice the change in the room, Harry’s frozen body, the shift in the air.

He’s on Niall’s bed, sitting in the same position, staring at Harry. Harry tried twice before to get this one to leave him alone. He outran him the first time, all the way across campus even though he didn’t have his good running shoes on. The second time was yesterday, when he was with Zayn at the campus bookstore trying on UPENN sweatshirts. He stared at Harry through the clothes racks, inching closer and closer, until Harry told Zayn they should race each other to dinner. Harry won, of course.

But he’s not giving up, he’s not going away, or getting the hint that Harry can’t do anything for him. Sometimes Harry swears they think he has control over their situation, that if he runs away from them, it means they won’t have closure and will have to stay. Or conversely, maybe some think that if he hears their stories, it means he can direct them towards the “light.” They must think he’s important.

So this one stares at him expectantly, a middle-aged man so thin and gaunt, Harry’s grandma would’ve told him not to turn sideways, lest he disappear entirely. His hair’s receding, his eyes dead either from being dead, or just sunken from his past trouble. He seems sad. He must’ve died in the heart of summer, if his thin shorts and even thinner shirt are anything to go by. Italian, maybe. German. Skin pallid, teeth yellowing.

“Have you told the RA?” Zayn interrupts Harry’s train of thought, his screwdriver banging around haphazardly.

“Niall tried.”

“And?”

“It’s an old building, I guess. But it’s fine.”

The man on Niall’s bed glances to Zayn, to the boy moving around Harry’s room like he owns the place. But he doesn’t pay him much mind after that, his eyes finding Harry again.

“It’s fucking freezing in here, Haz. And I swear it’s not this cold outside. It can’t be. This isn’t okay.”

“It is what it is,” Harry says in a low voice, frowning. He blinks at the man.

Zayn’s movements still, his entire body gone rigid, and Harry could swear Zayn must feel the temperature drop further. The man leans forward, eyes set. Harry hates a staring contest, especially like this, so close and contained. He wishes Safaa were around. It feels a little warmer when she is. He misses her.

Zayn turns to him after Harry says the colloquialism, his face blank, right as the man on the opposite bed finally speaks.

“I didn’t do this,” the man whispers, hands wringing in his lap.

Harry blinks at him.

“They think I did it to myself, but I swear I didn’t,” his lip trembles. “I… I just… it wasn’t supposed to be that much, you know? Gina said it wasn’t that much. She said so.”

Harry blinks.

Zayn watches Harry like he’s lost it.

“My dad thinks I did it on purpose, he swears I fucked myself up for the last time. I – I try to tell him sometimes, when he’s by himself that I didn’t do it, I didn’t mean it.”

Harry swallows the bile in his mouth as his breath swirls around him. It’s dropping further, it’s so cold, so fucking frigid, his fingertips have lost all feeling. Zayn quietly and gingerly comes to sit next to him, to grip his hands. Zayn doesn’t say a word, just watches Harry stare intently at nothing at all across the room.

Zayn tries to speak to him, Harry knows because he can feel his breath on his cheek, the shake to his arm. He’s trying to snap Harry out of it, to bring him back from wherever he’s gone. And it’s not quite a loop this time, but it’s close. Harry can’t stop staring at the man, he won’t stop talking.

“It was just another night, just a little,” his voice rises, anger and confusion creeping in, as he holds out his arms.

Needle marks. Bruises. Blue veins. Ruptures beneath his almost-translucent skin.

“But I didn’t want this, I didn’t do it. I didn’t do it,” he starts to cry. “Can you go tell my dad? Can you talk to my dad? I bet he’d listen to you. You can tell him it was an accident.”

He shakes his arms, his hands in fists, his eyes crazed.

Zayn pulls at Harry’s hand so hard, he feels the skin of his inner wrist break a little beneath a fingernail.

Alan. His name is Alan.

“I’ll take you to my dad, just come with me. I didn’t want it,” Alan starts to yell now, loudly from Niall’s bed. Harry just stares at him. He can’t move. He’s gone. He almost opens his mouth to tell Alan to be quiet, he needs to calm down, but he can barely breathe. His lungs feel full of smoke. If Alan gets too upset, he’ll break something. He’ll hurt Harry. He’ll give away the fact that he’s there. Zayn’s in the room, Zayn’s right next to them.

Until he’s not, he’s at the door, yelling down the hall.

“Say something! Come on!” Alan shakes his arms harder, wailing. He makes like he’s about to stand up finally, to cross the room and scream in Harry’s face, or worse, touch him. He could do to Harry what Alan’s dad Eugene used to do to him, when Alan didn’t do as he was told. Alan had it rough. He could lash out.

Suddenly Niall’s there next to him on the bed, shaking him. They both shake him, so hard Harry feels like he’s in the middle of an earthquake, until the ghost is gone and all Harry can see is a set of eyes an inch from his face. Zayn.

“Harry,” Zayn yells at him, his breath suddenly warmer, with some life back in it, breezing across Harry’s face. It feels like a breath of fresh air, like the sun on his skin.

“I’m sorry,” he shakes his head to clear it, blinking furiously. “I’m good. I’m all good.”

“What is _wrong?”_ Zayn shrugs harshly, eyes afraid. “Babe, you’re shaking.”

“Harry, what just happened?” Niall says from his right, voice smaller, unsure, scared. “What was that?”

Harry stares at Zayn in front of him, before glancing at Niall. The room feels better now, not as cold, the candles sending shadows across the oak walls. The three boys sit in silence, their hands on his arms as he shakes like a leaf. Harry doesn’t know how to explain it, he’s never been able to explain it, not to his mom or his doctor or his counselor. He’s never had friends so close to it, he’s never had friends, he can’t put it into words.

He can’t.

They can’t know.

So Harry tries to relax his body. It comes to him suddenly. He blinks, before very purposefully bringing his eyes back to Zayn. He curls his lips into a grin. He grins so hard, so maniacally, he could probably be the Joker. He laughs hard, throws his head back, grabs at his stomach, the best fake laugh he can come up with under pressure and at a moment’s notice. The boys stare at him.

Niall gets it first, with a quick slap to Harry’s thigh.

“You’re a fucking asshole,” he ends up laughing with him. “That was seriously fucking creepy.”

“I’m sorry,” Harry pretends to wipe a tear from his eye. “You should’ve seen your faces.”

“What the fuck,” Zayn’s face scrunches, confused, as he steps back. “That…”

“This fucker told me he loved Halloween,” Niall shakes his head, still smiling. He smacks at Harry’s face, as Harry grabs for his wrists, the two of them fighting playfully. “Should’ve known he be into scaring people. Thought you were possessed or something, shit.”

“You’re too easy, Ni,” Harry laughs again, the smile not quite reaching his eyes, swatting at Niall’s dick.

“Guess you guys have a weird sense of humor,” Zayn tries to smile like he thinks it’s funny, rubbing at his neck.

He ends up toying with the thermostat some more, as Niall launches into his plan for the coming Halloween party at Zayn’s shared house. He’ll need Harry to help him bring the decorations over, to add to Sabrina’s haul. Harry tries to listen, but he keeps glancing at the firm ridges of Zayn’s back as he works.

He’s too tense for Harry’s liking, too wound up and inside his own head. They’re new friends, brand new to each other, but Harry knows Zayn’s body already. He knows the quirks and movements and shifts of it. He can tell. He remembers the way Zayn used to close himself off back in fifth grade, even when Harry tried with all his might to hate Zayn. It’s a little hazy to him now, but he remembers Zayn’s old face. It was too pinched. Too angry. Too sad.

Safaa comes back a few minutes later, to hover near Zayn’s right shoulder. Harry knows now that she’s his sister. She’s not as bright today, more subdued than she usually is. She doesn’t bounce or play. She just sticks close to Zayn, to calm him down. To ease his worry.

If Harry could whisper it without being heard, he swears he’d tell her he’s sorry.

 

***

 

So that’s the plan Harry sticks with, he decides the next morning as he walks towards Bennett Hall. It’s not as cool as it’s been the last few days, the sun slicing through the trees to warm the students up, their paces not as quick now that they don’t have the wind licking their heels. Harry thinks it must be a good sign, the way the sun shines on his face. He hopes that it means it should work out for the time being.

His friends think he’s a prankster now, an idiot who likes to fool around and play. He’s the kid who loves Halloween. Hasn’t he said already said so? He admitted to liking the spooky holiday, so really, neither Niall nor Zayn could be surprised by his “joke” the day before. If it happens again, if one shows up uninvited and he gets sucked into it, he’ll just say it’s a joke. A funny joke, some dumb thing he likes to do to freak people out. That’s all.

It’s just that Zayn still didn’t seem to buy it. Harry knows Zayn isn’t an idiot, that he’d seen Harry freak out twice before. He’s seen the real Harry. So after the “joke” Zayn couldn’t shake the weirdness, especially after Niall decided to stay in the room and sleep in his own bed. Zayn didn’t offer to leave, or go back to the house he shares with about seven other people. He didn’t dip out, or make an excuse to leave Harry Styles once and for all, the fucking weirdo he only befriended for a few weeks because he was desperate. He stayed. He crawled into Harry’s bed like every night since they met, with his feet double-socked, to curl up along Harry’s back like it was no big deal. But he was quiet about it. Careful. Like Harry could break in his hands if he wasn’t gentle enough.

Harry wonders if he’s always this transparent, or if it’s just Zayn reading him closely. Because Harry tried with all his might to act fine, to joke with Niall and comment on how sick he felt after eating too much ice cream. He pretended the shake to his hands was from the cold, and not because he worried Alan would come back. He tried to be an idiot freshman, where the only things on his mind were classes and partying and maybe sucking the dick of the hot guy in his room. Zayn didn’t buy it, Harry knew.

He knew because Safaa stayed close. She didn’t leave last night. She’s still with them, bobbing alongside Zayn as they walk to class. She was Zayn’s dust bunny, like the ones Harry remembers as a baby. A guiding light. A sidekick.

Zayn seems somewhat back to normal now, as he saunters along with a cup of coffee in one hand, a cigarette in the other, and a smile on his face. He’s a tad farther away now, not as tucked close to Harry so that their elbows touch. Harry should be happy about it, since he’s trying to keep Zayn at arm’s length. But he finds that misses the heat of him, sadly.

As they reach the juncture of the three streets that Fisher-Bennett rests on, Zayn knocks Harry’s foot with his own. He needs to head off towards Hayden Hall, for his sociology class. And it’s about then, as their feet knock together, that Harry realizes Zayn walked with him to Bennett even though it was completely out of his way.

“Alright well,” Zayn smiles at him, tossing his cigarette to the ground. “I’ll come by later?”

“If you want,” Harry tries to smile back, but it gets lost in translation somewhere.

“Do you want me to?”

“Do you want to?”

“I hate when you answer questions with questions.”

“I know,” Harry smiles for real then, gripping his bag tighter. Even if it’s warm out, his fingers still feel a tad cold.

Zayn must known because he grabs for Harry’s hand and holds on. He almost cracks Harry’s knuckles he holds so tight, to get the circulation going.

“I’ll bring you chocolate. In fact, I’ll bring you Swedish Fish too, and those sour candy belts, the strawberry ones, even though they’re disgusting.”

“They’re good,” Harry gets defensive, stepping slightly closer, going against every warning bell going off in his head.

“They’re disgusting.”

“Just because you’re not a sour candy kind of man doesn’t mean we all aren’t,” Harry scoffs, reaching for Zayn’s coffee. He steals it completely and finishes it before Zayn can react. Harry chuckles to himself, right as his eyes drift up to the old brick building he needs to scurry off into. The main entrance has a six-story tall central tower, making the whole building look like some miniature medieval castle, complete with a battlement along the roofline.

And there in the large window above the double doors leading to Harry’s English class, is a boy their age with his fingers thrumming the glass excitedly. He’s smiling, big and dopey, his light brown hair getting caught in his eyelashes. Harry is reminded of a puppy in a window, paws up on the glass like _pick me!_ He waves to Harry, like they’re old friends, like he wants nothing more than for Harry to run into the building so they can catch up. _Pick me!_

It’s too hard to tell if the boy is a ghost, or just a friendly stranger. Maybe he knows Harry from somewhere, maybe they went to school together when Harry bounced around to so many of them before high school. Maybe he’s actually waving to Zayn.

Zayn follows Harry’s line of sight up to the window.

“What do you see?” he whispers, stepping closer.

And as Harry meets Zayn’s eyes again, neither is smiling. It’s a simple question, but it feels about as heavy as an anvil. Harry pictures one falling out of the sky right then and there, to crush like him Wile E. Coyote.

Ghost it is, then.

“Nothing,” Harry smiles, tossing Zayn’s coffee cup to a trashcan near the walkway.

“I wish you would tell me,” Zayn leans in, breath tickling Harry’s chin. “I feel… I feel like I’m always two steps behind, you know? I… you always seem like you’re keeping a secret.”

_I can see ghosts. They talk to me. They hurt me when I won’t talk back. I’m scared all the time. You watched them lock me away. You didn’t call for help. I think I’m still angry about it. Your dead sister follows you around._

“No secrets, Zayn,” Harry tries to shake it off. “I’m all good.”

“Whenever you want to tell me, I’m here. I’m not like, going anywhere. You’re my – ”

Harry tries to step away then.

“You’re my friend, too. Probably the best these days,” Harry tries to smile through it, punching Zayn’s arm playfully. “But I’m all good.”

He steps back further. He sees Zayn Malik in front of him, the boy who wants to study social work so he can help people, and he has to go. He feels it getting too heavy, how he knows Zayn likes to help him come back to himself, and how much Zayn wants to counsel kids someday. They’ve only been friends for two weeks and he knows Zayn’s favorite kind of candy already. He knows Zayn is afraid of heights and hates oranges. He knows his coffee order. They have inside jokes and a shared stick of deodorant on Harry’s desk for when they’re running late. Zayn wants to hold his hand and he kisses Harry’s cheek before they go to sleep in Harry’s bed night after night. And now there’s a ghost waving to Harry from a window, and Zayn can sense the secret. He wants Harry to tell him what’s wrong, what’s really and truly wrong.

It all feels way too fucking intimate.

So Harry gestures to the building over his shoulder, and makes like he’s late. But Zayn is fast, so fucking quick in his movements, and reaches for him first.

Harry doesn’t want to get sucked into the kiss, but it still happens. Zayn holds his face between his palms and kisses him hard as a swirl of undergrads parade around them in the sunshine. Despite himself, Harry kisses back, their lips a collision of hot and cold. Fire and ice. Harry feels the tingling in his hands and feet, that energy surge he felt that first night in his dorm. He thought it was just Safaa arriving, but maybe not.

Zayn opens up Harry’s mouth with a deft tongue, smooth and just on the right side of too slick. He tugs Harry’s hair so they can stand closer, an obscene gesture out in the open like this, and all Harry can comprehend is that Zayn tastes like a cigarette and a latte and the toffee he loves so much.

Harry loves toffee, too.

Zayn eventually ends the kiss so he can step away. They stand there breathless, lips red and raw like they’d been sucking on crystal candy: it rips your mouth to shreds, practically kills it. But what a way to go.

“We’re not friends,” Zayn says as he presses the back of his hand to his chin, almost surprised with himself for being so forceful with it.

Harry opens his mouth to respond, but nothing comes out.

“I’ll see you in your room later,” Zayn finishes, before turning away.

Harry expects the boy in the window to be gone, but he’s still there smiling when Harry enters the building.

He refuses to look up though.

 

***

 

Harry leaves class early. He hates to do it because he used to be the sick kid in school all the time, and always fell so far behind. But he can barely hear a word that’s being said, and then out of nowhere, he finds himself whispering to the TA near the back of the lecture hall that he feels on the verge of vomiting. The girl grips his arm warmly and wishes him a speedy recovery, her cheeks pink and body angled towards him.

He stumbled outside and resolutely does not look up. He runs back to his dorm in hopes that he’ll have the room alone for awhile, which feels a bit weird. It’s like ever since Zayn walked into the ice cream shop and stole a lick, Harry’s craved him. Every free second of the day seemed to be enveloped by Zayn Malik, and Harry never realized it might not be a good thing, until he’s relieved to see that his dorm room is empty.

A nap feels like the right thing to do, so Harry strips down to his boxers and crawls under his comforter. It’s what he used to when when he was especially scared. He hides under a layer of blanket, because if he can’t see the ghost, or the problem, or the assholes from school laughing at him, maybe they don’t exist for awhile.

If Harry pretends like Zayn didn’t kiss him that morning, maybe it never happened at all.

Harry can’t have a Zayn in his life, not now, and he never should’ve let it get this far. He never should’ve pulled Zayn up to his room. That’s where it all started. It was an invitation that Zayn took to mean something. Harry should’ve listened to the voice in his head and ran away by himself. He’s dealt with the ghosts by himself his entire life. It’s the only way he knows how to navigate the world. He doesn’t want to end up like “Twilight Zone” Henry, at a tiresome job full of people, married to someone who can never understand what it’s like. Harry shouldn’t have made that night in his dorm into anything at all. He shouldn’t have let Zayn see him freak out. It’s just made it easier to let Zayn see it happen every other time since. To worry over him, to kiss his cheek softly, to keep him safe.

So really, it’s Harry’s own fault.

Zayn is a good distraction. That’s all.

So their kiss can’t mean anything. Harry nods and promises to be better. He exhales slowly and closes his eyes, to drift into a dreamless sleep.

 

***

 

As proof, when Harry wakes up from his nap groggy and out of sorts, he swiftly moves his entire body away from the heat source over his shoulder. Zayn, draped over his back, his hand warm over Harry’s chest. Lips pressed to Harry’s neck.

Harry’s pretty sure friends don’t sleep together as much as they do, and certainly not as close, so it needs to stop. He shifts so far away from Zayn so quickly, it jostles the entire bed.

Zayn rolls onto his back and stretches his arms over his head, waking up on his own time. He gets a face when he stretches, somehow turns into a cartoon character with how weird his mouth moves, this exaggerated expression Harry sort of wants to take a picture of. But he shakes his head to rid the thought.

Harry realizes too late that his breath comes out ragged and harsh, white and thick like smoke, like the air itself has broken into pieces in front of his face. He sits up in bed and hopes it’s just Saf. _Please_ be Safaa, taking up too much warmth to show herself, to play.

He’s under Niall’s bed, a teenage boy with a gash across his entire face, his exposed jawbone glistening in the lamplight, a few internal organs hanging out of the wound below his belly button. The scream rips from Harry’s chest before he can stop it, the surge of adrenaline practically _hurts_ , as it rushes from tip to toe. It’s the worst surprise, the ones who lay dead in front of Harry like he stumbled upon a body in the woods. He’s just there, dead dead dead, skin waxy, lips blue, eyes open and staring at Harry. He’s not even hiding, he’s just laying there like it’s where he dropped dead the first time.

Harry scrambles away from the scene in front of him and falls clean off the bed, ass hitting the floor so hard, it’ll bruise. He’ll leave soon, he has to, it’s too awful. Harry should run, should hide under the covers, should turn to the wall and count to a thousand. _I see you, you’re here, I get it, you exist, please leave._

Zayn must’ve heard the commotion, because he falls right after Harry to reach for his arms, to help.

“Harry, what’s wrong?” he gets closer, his mouth an inch from Harry’s there on the old dusty floor.

“I’m good, I’m fine,” Harry rubs at his face. “I’m all good.”

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.”

“Bullshit.”

“Just leave it, okay?” Harry tries to sound harsh, moving away from Zayn and towards his desk. He reaches for a bag on the floor to cover it, like he meant to end up on the floor, to pick up his things.

“Fuck,” Zayn grunts to himself, getting up off the floor. They match, both in their boxers, the sun only set behind the treeline for an hour or so. It’s still early, around dinnertime on a Friday. Zayn came just like he said he would.

Harry busies himself by organizing random shit on his desk, his back to Zayn and the boy under Niall’s bed and the energy surging behind Zayn’s back. It’s too much in one room, Saf and the boy both pulling at the air around them. It feels heavy, suffocating, like Harry can’t see through it. Foggy.

“I’m getting really tired of asking you if you’re okay,” Zayn says in a low voice, pulling on his jeans.

“So stop asking,” Harry turns to him, face blank.

“Fine.”

“Great.”

They stand there, staring at each other, when Niall bursts in the door with Sabrina and two other girls in tow. They stumble slightly, their heels clicking obnoxiously on the floor, holding hands. Niall holds Sabrina up by the hips, their conversation clearly hilarious and interesting. They don’t even take in the fact that Zayn and Harry look upset, practically naked, in a freezing cold room.

Eventually Niall notices, as Harry pulls on a shirt. His blond head bounces from one boy to the other, a little too sloppy to be sober, and blinks lazily.

“So…” he draws out the _o_ , holding up a bottle of whiskey. “Happy hour, then?”

Zayn grabs for his clothes. He kicks a plastic bag all the way across the floor, where it lands next to the dead boy’s foot. He whispers something to Sabrina and kisses her cheek, before kissing the other girls as well. And then he’s gone.

The girls start crawling onto Niall’s bed. One sprawls at Niall’s desk, as Niall begins to describe the joke Harry pulled the day before. Harry hears one of the girls whisper to the other, about his curls and the size of his feet, but he ignores the attention. The room doesn’t feel so heavy anymore, now that Saf is gone. The boy slowly dissipates, not that Harry watches him go. He turns to his desk to hold the plastic bag and sift through the contents.

Hershey’s kisses. Swedish Fish. Mini Snickers. A lollipop shaped like a pumpkin. Sour strawberry belts.

 

***

“This box is fucking heavy,” Harry scowls as he trudges up the stairs to Sabrina’s Spruce Hill Victorian the next night.

He’s not exactly in the mood, after how much of an ass he was the day before to Zayn. He ate all the candy Zayn brought, just to make himself sick, and then slept a restless sleep without Zayn beside him. He spent his entire Saturday in the library, head in a book, while a whole fucking family consisting of four fucking ghosts in 1800s clothing stared at him from near the stacks, unblinking for hours. Saf tried to follow him for awhile, but he shook her off when he went on a run. Then that fucking boy from Bennett waved at him from the roof, and honestly, Harry just wanted to wallow in peace anywhere besides Zayn's own house. He felt like Henry from “The Twilight Zone,” just begging the universe to be left alone. He couldn't see Zayn after how he acted, not today. So Harry scowls further, hitching the box of decorations and Halloween shit higher up on his hip, silently praying Zayn isn't home.

“Do you want a tissue to cry into?” Niall levels him with a look, kicking at the door with his foot. He starts calling Sabrina’s name. He even yells for Zayn a few times, to open up and let them in.

A few people answer the door together, clearly other roommates from the house. Harry tries to be polite and introduce himself, but the box has started to cut into his fingers. They end up dropping their decorations and supplies onto the dining room floor, as music booms from somewhere in the attic. A football game blasts from the flatscreen in the living room, and someone seems to be cooking something spicy in the kitchen.

Even though Harry hates this old house, and this old part of town full of spirits spanning the decades, he can see the appeal to some. You’d definitely never be alone around here.

Harry can’t help but be awkward as he stands there in his busted boots and black pea coat, his long hair twisted in a bun. These people, the guys and pretty girls Niall hangs out with, all here on scholarships for sports and art and debate, they all burst with energy. They’re excitable and funny, cracking jokes and slapping hands. They try to include Harry by handing him a beer and asking about his major. They’re all perfectly nice. But Harry sort of wants to blend into the cracked wall behind them, right into the wallpaper. He sips the beer and frowns. He misses Zayn.

Right around then, Harry feels the sizzle in his feet, that old buzzing energy he’s come to recognize. It’s like he’s been sitting on them for hours, his feet asleep and trying to reawaken, like old static from a television. It’s like a rope wraps itself around his waist, because soon he’s out of the dining room and away from the party planning, and is instead walking up the massive staircase towards the house’s upper levels. It’s suddenly quiet, all sound sucked out like vacuum, as Harry ascends the creaking stairs

The wood paneled walls and stain glass windows above the stairs radiate with energy, like they’re whispering. A chandelier hangs from a massive chain from the highest section of the ceiling, and Harry swears it starts to swing slightly.

He takes one step at a time, not even tripping over himself, and it’s like he’s being lead somewhere important. Harry can’t tear his eyes away from the massive vaulted ceiling, the chandelier lights dancing across the painting of saints and sinners, surrounded by carved wooden angels looking down at the world. It’s beautiful.

Suddenly a head peaks over the landing above him, and Harry almost collapses. He falls against the wall as his heart beats in his throat, as his eyes lock with the boy from Bennett. He’s so happy, gleeful even, as he looks over his shoulder at something.

Harry can’t move from his position against the wall halfway up the stairs, too afraid to move into the depths of this strange house. How did he even end up here? He should go find Niall. He should forget it. What if one is trying to get him to the top? What if they just want him in a loop?

The boy comes back to the railing’s edge and smiles wider at him. He winks and then he’s gone. Harry tries to turn around, he takes a step down instead of up, but then he’s moving up the stairs. It’s not against his will necessarily, but it’s against his better judgement. He prays it’s not towards a loop, but instead towards an answer as to why his feet won’t stop vibrating.

Harry crosses himself and kisses his fingers.

He ends up in a room on the third floor, tucked in the northeast corner facing the street. Zayn’s room. He wonders if he should venture inside. The door is open, so he shrugs as he walks in without knocking. It’s as old and weathered as the house, a UPENN flag tacked to one wall, a poster of “The Godfather” on another. A bulletin board with family photos, candy wrappers littered across the wood floor alongside dirty socks and crumpled test papers. It has Zayn written all over it, just messy enough, books with other books stuffed inside them as bookmarks, an overstuffed ashtray. It sits beneath a cracked window, the outside breeze filtering in with a low whistle. Harry shivers and then quickly realizes that Safaa is there.

She twinkles at him near Zayn’s desk in the corner, so he walks over to see if he can feel her. She’s warm tonight, glowing like a little firefly, and Harry can’t help but smile. She’s too sweet not to.

“What’s your name?”

Harry twirls around.

The boy with the hair across his forehead. The one with the sharp incisors and rosy cheeks. The puppy from the Bennett window, the one from the landing. On Zayn’s unmade bed, twirling a set of keys between his thick fingers, smiling. He’s attractive, tan, in a tank top and dirty Adidas shorts. Barefoot.

Harry swallows the lump in his throat. His mouth goes dry, his hands numb, his stomach in one big knot.

The boy cocks his head to the side.

“Harry,” he coughs. “My name is Harry.”

“Harry,” the boy repeats it.

“Yes.”

“And you can see me.”

“I can,” Harry nods.

“And you can see her,” he gestures to Saf in the corner, over Harry’s shoulder.

“Yes.”

“That must blow,” he smiles menacingly.

“Yes,” Harry ends up backing towards the window. “It does.”

The boy hops up and comes to join Harry near the window, at a safe distance which Harry appreciates. They level each other, eyes roaming, as he plays with the keys now in his pocket. The ghost before him doesn’t run as cold, Harry notes. It doesn’t feel as awful to be this close. He doesn’t feel so terrible. But it could just be because he’s in Zayn’s room. And even without Zayn in it, the space _feels_ like him.

Louis. His name is Louis. Louis William Something. And Louis must know that Harry knows his name because he smiles again, wider. _See, you got there in the end,_ Louis says with only a wink.

They both turn to drift towards the window, alongside Saf, their hands in their pockets. It’s like suddenly an easiness settles in the room. Harry watches Safaa flutter around them, darting back and forth like she wants to play tag. Louis laughs a little when she settles near his head, bored with them.

People come and go from the front sidewalk, a guy runs out of the house with a backpack. Harry hears Niall yell something after him, about helping with decorations for the upcoming party. The guy flips him off as he hops their short gate. A couple walk down the street with their cocker spaniel. A ghost from across the street, on the same level as them in another attic, screams angrily to Harry from a window.

Louis ignores the screaming woman, so Harry does too.

“He’s not happy with you,” Louis says with a slight shrug.

“I figured.”

“Why?” Louis asks.

“Because I was an asshole. I’m sort of an asshole.”

“You don’t seem like an asshole.”

“I am.”

Louis nods like he understands.

“You should say sorry. And then buy him a Big Mac, because it’s his favorite food. And then suck his dick.”

“Jesus,” Harry laughs, his face even redder. Saf doesn’t understand the reference _thank God_ , and just bobs alongside them like a twinkling lightbulb.

The woman from across the street in the identical attic finally leaves. She may find him eventually, Harry thinks with a sigh. But at least she’s not sucking the energy out of him at the moment.

“Can I ask who you are?” Harry says in a low voice, even though he sort of already knows.

“I’m his best friend,” Louis answers quietly. “I’m his very best friend.”

“Oh.”

“And he really fucking likes you. So if you’re going to be his new best friend, don’t make him feel like shit.”

“I’ll try.”

“Good.”

“Thanks, Lou.”

They watch the streetlamps along the block flicker a few times, sending ominous shadows towards the yard. Another small group has formed, three women and an old man with a walker, and they all silently move their heads together, up towards the window to look at Harry. He doesn’t feel so scared though. Not now, not so close to someone like Louis. It feels like Louis’s been around a lot longer than just a few minutes. Louis jingles his keys a few times, right as Safaa bounces a few times to get his attention.

“How’s that sound, Saf?” Harry smiles to her. “You think he’ll like the Big Mac? You think he’ll take it?”

She laughs so hard, she ends up rolling around with it. Harry can’t help but laugh along with her, with Louis by his side.

But then he hears the creak behind him, the absurdly creepy door creak that might as well be from a horror movie. Someone else has entered the room. Harry’s heart rate quickens and he worries for his throat, for the icy hands that could close around it. He’s ignored so many of them today. He’s ran miles around them. They could be so angry.

But it’s not a ghost. It’s not the dead.

“Harry.”

Harry turns his head, as he realizes it’s just him now, to see Zayn standing in the doorway. Louis and Saf have gone. It’s just Zayn and Harry, staring at each other. Harry has finally been caught. Zayn probably heard the whole thing.

Zayn doesn’t move. His entire body stands frozen, his face so white and scared as he gapes at Harry, it’s like he’s seeing a ghost of his own.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Twitter](http://twitter.com/this_onegoes/)   
>  [Tumblr](http://this-onegoes.tumblr.com/)


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you Jasmine and Crystal. God only knows what I'd be without you.

***

 

Harry supposes he himself can be quite the ghost, when he wants to be. He runs cold; he barely speaks if he doesn’t have to. Ghosts get from place to place as fast as anything, if they really want it badly enough. Harry runs. He keeps quiet.

But above all else, the one trait that truly makes Harry a ghost is a simple one: he only sees what he wants to see.

Harry focuses so hard sometimes, on the here and now, on getting from one day to the next, he doesn’t remember all the important days that came before. It’s only natural to lock away the bad thoughts, to tuck the mistakes and faults into a box, shoved at the back of a closet. But it’s important to sift through the remnants once in awhile. It’s important to remember a past encounter, a traumatic experience, and see what it taught you. See what you did with it.

Harry only sees what he wants to see. He remembers the day he got locked in the crawl space by those boys, but he conveniently forgets the days after. When Harry showed his true self.

Because Harry forgets the darkness inside him. The chunks of himself that make him a bad person.

A bad boy.

That’s what Harry had to remind himself of earlier, when Zayn caught him talking to his dead best friend and sister in his room. He had to chant it in his head, like he used to when a group of them would crowd around him in his room and scratch his skin, as he ran down the stairs of Zayn’s house.

_I’m a bad boy._

Harry used to think he was bad. Defective. Evil. A demon. He used to think it was all his fault.

When ghosts started following Harry around in the fourth grade, after the first man walked out of his closet, Harry figured it was his fault. He used to imagine it as a physical thing, a lump of black tar churning in his chest cavity, something so tangible that if you sliced him open, you’d see it flop out onto the carpet. A darkness inside him, a black pit of evil, the snake from the Garden of Eden. Something wrong with him. A reason for the dark shadows to chase him.

It was even from simple things unrelated to the ghosts. It was like every time he refused to take his vitamins, or begged for cake and sugar like a brat, he figured it was because he wasn’t a good kid. He _was_ a brat. And maybe when little boys were brats, they had to pay for it, with strange women in frilly dresses and old men with bloody hands screaming at all hours of the night.

Harry saw what he wanted to see when he looked in the mirror the night after the loop in the crawl space. He stared at himself, ignored the dead woman with black eyes standing over his shoulder, and really looked at himself. He saw it plain as day: a naughty child who deserved to be punished.

So that’s what Harry sees now that he’s back in his dorm, his eyes red, his hair a mess. He stares at himself in the mirror over his dresser and imagines the black beating heart in his chest.

_You’re cruel. Do you know? How cruel you are?_

Zayn had said it to Harry earlier in his room, and Harry knows without a doubt that it’s true. He hasn’t been that cruel to another human being in a very long time, not since Marcus.

_If you only knew._

The last time Harry showed his true colors was six days after the incident at Marcus McCusker’s birthday party. It was six days after Harry held onto his mother’s fingers as they handed over a present to Marcus’s mother, their eyes straying into the fancy brownstone on Locust Street, with its elegance and fancy renaissance-worthy architecture. Harry saw Anne smooth her hair a few too many times, nervous for the whole thing.

It was then that the group of boys from his class locked him in the crawl space. Harry had found it by accident, when he wandered off looking for the bathroom. His mom had encouraged him to go find it on his own, with a tight smile. She wanted to blend into the conversation with the other mothers in Marcus’s kitchen, even though he knew it made her uncomfortable. Marcus came from money, just like Zayn and Reece and Thomas and Yohan. They had nice blazers for their school uniforms, whereas Harry had a second-hand one. His had patches over the elbows and his tie didn’t fit quite right. Being around the rich St. Anthony mothers always made Anne’s smile too tight.

So Harry peed upstairs in the bathroom and wished more than anything to be back at home in his bedroom. He had books to read. He hated being invited to birthday parties just because it was a school rule, to invite the whole class to be fair and polite. No one ever wanted weird Harry Styles there, not really, so no one talked to him, unless it was under their breaths to laugh in his face. He especially didn’t want to be invited to Marcus McCusker’s birthday party. Marcus was the one who made Harry literally get on the ground and eat dirt a few times. He cut Harry’s hair with scissors when he sat behind him in social studies, huge chunks of it Harry could never explain.

He called Harry a pussy. That was his favorite word, “pussy.” Harry couldn’t even really argue it by that point, even when he tried so hard not to cry until he got home most days.

A few of them found him by accident. The three boys came up the stairs and saw Harry staring at the small door to the crawl space, his mouth slightly open, his hands clammy. A rogue red balloon bounced against the door a few times, before floating towards the ceiling. Harry watched it go, before he focused back on the door. He tilted his head.

The boys saw. They watched weirdo Harry Styles and couldn’t believe their luck. They could never know the voices Harry heard inside it, the pleading and whispering, the two men stuck there. They were too quick for him to react, like a tactical team dead set on the goal of getting him inside. Unspoken. Harry remembers seeing a flash of Zayn Malik’s face as Yohan kicked his left foot inside last, right before Marcus slammed the door shut. Harry had already started to cry, and he was pretty sure Zayn was as well.

But it’s not the loop that Harry thinks about, as he shakes his head while looking in the mirror now. He doesn’t like to think about that loop now. He forces himself to think about the following week, the last day of the school year, when Harry resolved to never set foot on that playground ever again. He remembers the slithering in his belly, the curdling of the tar, the way his entire body vibrated.

Marcus and his friends, Zayn included, stood by the doors leading into the cafeteria. Summer was only an hour away. They were laughing about something, as they swapped leftover candy from their lunch bags, back and forth with intricate deals and trades. They never offered Harry any. No one ever did.

Harry locked eyes with Marcus, right as his hands curled into fists. And Marcus must’ve seen Harry’s fists, because he laughed so hard, threw his head back and everything, at what he thought to be a challenge. As if Harry Styles could fight back, or fight at all. Marcus left the boys near the old brick building and practically skipped over to Harry, hell bent on telling Harry to get a grip.

“You gonna cry again, Styles?” he sneered, licking at the grape Blow Pop that had dyed his mouth. His perfectly coiffed brown hair glinted in the sunlight, his blazer sat on his shoulders just so, his expensive loafers kicking rocks towards Harry’s shins. “Need the ambulance called again?”

“No,” Harry croaked, his hands still in fists.

“So you wanna fight me? Is that what this is?” Marcus laughed, his purple teeth on display.

“No.”

“So what then?”

“I wanted to tell you something.”

Marcus rolled his eyes at his friends over his shoulder. The boys took that as their cue, walking towards Harry and Marcus by the jungle gym they were too cool to play on. Zayn Malik didn’t join them, though. Suddenly Harry remembers how Zayn stayed put and leaned against the school, staring at his shoes.

Harry wanted it to just be the two of them, though. So before the other boys got too close, he stepped to Marcus and dropped his voice.

“Your dad hated you,” he whispered.

Marcus didn’t smile after that.

“What?”

“He told me so. He visited me. He said he hated you, that you were a waste.”

“What? Shut up,” Marcus stepped back, the Blow Pop dropped into the dirt.

“He died when you were seven. While driving to pick you up from karate. A red car hit his van, and he didn’t even think of you before he died. You weren’t even on his mind.”

Marcus’s entire face fell, his eyes shone in tears, his lip started to shake. He was scared of Harry then, and Harry knew it. He had him. He finally won.

“He told me last night. We had a laugh over it. You weren’t even _there_ ,” Harry poked at his own temple. “You weren’t there at all. Just your mom and your sister and his parents and how much he’d miss them all. That was his final thought.”

“Stop it,” Marcus cried outright, right as the other boys came up behind him with worried looks. Marcus cried and cried, wiping  at his face with his fists. “Shut up.”

“I just wanted you to know,” Harry finished, the snake in his stomach coiling into a ball.

And then Harry turned his back on them and walked off the black top. Marcus’s dad, a nice polite looking man who Harry really did see a few times standing alongside Marcus at school, watched Harry from the parking lot. He didn’t yell at Harry, though. He just shook his head like he was disappointed. It was the one and only time Harry ever admitted out loud that he could talk to the dead ones, until now, and it was the worst lie he’s ever uttered.

Harry cried the whole way home, even after he took off that stupid St. Anthony blazer and threw it in a dumpster. He cried under his blanket until it hurt. He cried until his mom came into his room and cried into his hair, begging him to tell her what was wrong. She was the one who held him after she finally got him out of the crawl space, once he had passed out. She saw the marks on his back. She kept asking what was wrong, and Harry didn’t want to get locked away, so he said the St. Anthony boys were mean. That was all.

But Harry was a bad boy. And bad boys get punished. So he told her yet again that he was crying because he didn’t want to go back to that school, because the boys were jerks, and she believed him.

And then Harry Styles suffered in silence. He pretended to be better, to be normal, to be good. Even when he bounced around to other schools and ran from his problems, even when the ghosts left bruises and welts, he never let his mom see him cry ever again. She knew when it was bad, could tell when the bullying continued at each new school, but he never admitted it. She believed, like every therapist she took him to, that his problems were socially related. Mean kids. Something to grow out of. A phase. So Harry played that card until ninth grade.

He got to high school and got to be so smart, so focused, she thought it was finally better. They all did. Harry kissed girls and then decided kissing boys was more fun. He studied and ran track, he let himself party sometimes, he ran from every ghost he ever saw.

Harry couldn’t forget his first loop, even if he tried. But like so many people before him, Harry only sees what he wants to see, if he tries hard enough. It wasn’t until Zayn called him cruel that Harry remembered the hurt he could cause. The pain and cruelty he could inflict so easily. He doesn’t necessarily feel sorry for Marcus McCusker, since he made Harry’s life a living hell that year. But it doesn’t excuse what Harry did.

If Harry could turn the mirror around, if he could wrench it from the wall between his stiff, cold fingers, he would. He doesn’t like the person he sees. He doesn’t like his reflection at all.

 

***

 

Harry’s not sure when his brain switched from “Zayn should stay away from me for good” to “ Maybe I’ll have enough cash to buy us two Big Macs tonight, if he’ll let me.” But it must’ve been right as Louis stepped to stand next to him, to look out Zayn’s window together. It was all Louis, with his calming presence and glinting eyes.

But just as fast as his brain made the jump to a new conclusion, to a future of friendship and eventual understanding, with Louis’s keys and Safaa’s laughter as their soundtrack, it dissipated. It was as dead and gone as thick cigarette smoke, the kind that lingers outside of bars and clubs for only a few seconds, before drifting towards the sky.

They stared at each other for so long, Harry’s pretty sure he heard the definite beginning _and_ ending of “American Pie” playing from the downstairs living room of Zayn’s house. Zayn surveyed Harry like he was a criminal, someone who broke into his most private of spaces, to sift through his drawers and take what he wanted. Harry couldn’t formulate a sentence, couldn’t think of anything to say, to ease the tension. He didn’t have Safaa to ignite some energy into the room. It was so still, so lifeless, and there weren’t even any dead people to crowd the space.

Harry had been caught red handed. Zayn heard him say Louis and Safaa’s names, he witnessed him speaking to no one, into thin air, with a smile on his face and an ease to his stance.

Zayn finally saw a version of the real Harry.

Finally, after stepping fully into the room to set his bag down, Zayn spoke first.

“Harry,” he said carefully, dropping Harry’s name like it was too heavy for his tongue. “I need you to tell me what just happened.”

And like so many times before, with so many people, with Zayn so recently, Harry had his standard _it was nothing_ s and _I’m all good_ s locked and loaded. They sat there on his tongue, not heavy at all, as light and frothy as latte foam. But Zayn held up a hand and frowned. They both knew it was useless this time.

“I fucking swear, if you try to say it was nothing, I will hit you.”

“I…”

Harry searched for something, for some relief, an escape. He contemplated running right then and there, just bolting from the house until his legs burned clean off.

But then it came to him suddenly, the solution to all his problems. Every past, present, and future problem Zayn and Harry could ever have, finally resolved. Harry had to bite his bottom lip so hard, to taste the copper, to psych himself up for it. He knew what had to be done.

Because Harry can’t have a Zayn in his life. He never should’ve let it get this far. It was for Zayn’s own good. He knew then that it was time for Zayn to see another version of the real Harry. The final version.

The worst version of all.

“Say something,” Zayn stepped to him, angry.

Harry blinked.

“Why did you say those names? Where did you hear those names?” Zayn said with another frown. “I heard you. You… you said ‘Lou.’ And… and ‘Saf,’ I know you did.”

Harry inhaled and exhaled slowly, before steeling himself further. He stepped away from Zayn so that Zayn wouldn’t be able to touch.

“I did,” Harry nodded.

“Wh – why? How do you know those names? Who were you talking to in here? That’s… that’s not funny. This isn’t funny.”

Harry crossed his arms and bit his lip again so it wouldn’t shake.

“Is this a joke? Are you… why did you pretend to talk to… to them?”

It had to be done.

“You don’t remember me, do you,” Harry said, like it was a statement and not a question.

“Am I supposed to? What are you talking about?”

“Now who’s the one answering questions with questions?”

“Harry!” Zayn yelled at him, his face red, crumbling before Harry’s very eyes. “Just stop! Stop talking like we’re in the middle of a fucking riddle!”

“You don’t remember me at all,” Harry had to shake his head like he was disappointed, like he was reading it off a script. “You really are a fucking idiot, aren’t you.”

Zayn’s jaw dropped.

“I’m Harry Styles, Zayn.”

“I know that. But what – ”

Harry narrowed his eyes and scoffed.

“Harry Styles. From St. Anthony’s Academy for Boys.”

Zayn’s brain must’ve been working in overdrive. He didn’t understand. He stood there and shook his head, like it would rattle something into place, a memory, a name.

“No one really said my name often enough to remember it. I was just that forgettable, I guess.”

“Harry,” Zayn tried to interrupt.

“Fifth grade. Marcus McCusker’s birthday party,” Harry dropped his voice lower. “You wore black jeans and a white button-up. You brought a present with a red balloon tied to it.”

Zayn’s jaw dropped a second time, so hard it almost hit the floor.

“Do you remember me now, Zayn? Or should I throw myself into your closet and cry to be let out?” Harry stepped closer, his arms now at his sides. “Should I cry for you? Should I bang my fists against the wood so hard, I bleed all over it? Would that help you remember me?”

“Holy shit,” Zayn whispered, backing away, until he hit the wall near the closet. “Holy _fucking_ shit. That was you?”

“You watched the whole thing. You stood there and watched them shove me into a hole barely big enough for a toddler to fit into, as I cried and cried to be let out. You were right there.”

“I…”

Zayn only took a few seconds to get it, to process what Harry had been trying to tell him. Just moments before, he walked into his bedroom to witness Harry speaking to no one at all, until he heard the Lou and Saf leave Harry’s pretty mouth.

Harry stepped closer, his pretty mouth in a true sneer, and Zayn got it. Harry saw the realization pass over his face.

Because Harry’s friends think he’s a prankster now, an idiot who likes to fool around and play. He’s the kid who loves Halloween. Hasn’t he already said so? He admitted to liking the spooky holiday; he loved the movies and the gore and the Tales from the Crypt. Harry Styles, the boy who stared into space and woke most mornings with a sheen of sweat already on his upper lip, scared of shadows and bumps in the night, with cold fingers and dead eyes, stood before Zayn as something different, something worse. Harry Styles was nothing but an actor, a storyteller, a freshman without a major who should go into writing screenplays.

Harry curled his lips into a grin. A grin so wide, so manic, to play the part. He could’ve been the Joker. Maybe Jack the Ripper, a silent killer who drew people in with a pointy smile, only to leave bodies and blood in his wake.

Zayn just stared at him.

“I knew _you_ the second I saw you, you know. We locked eyes and I knew it was you, the one who could’ve stopped it that day and didn’t. I saw you.”

“But –”

“The prank was supposed to last longer,” Harry smiled harder, to keep it up, like it was a minute until midnight on New Year’s Eve. “I was going to really play it up, maybe bring Niall into it somehow, go into a full trance or something while you watched in horror. And see, Sabrina told me all about Louis and Safaa, how sad and lonely you can get, how you cling and cling and cling to people, so fucking hard, until they can’t take it anymore and finally shove you away.”

Zayn clamped his mouth shut, his entire face trembling in haphazard movements, trying so hard not to cry.

“But when I heard you walk in behind me, I figured now was as good a time as any. Besides, it was starting to get boring,” Harry shrugged like it was nothing. “You just kept wondering if I was okay. You never asked the right questions, even though I was practically handing it to you on a silver platter. We were in a fucking horror movie, and you _could’ve_ been the hero. You could’ve fixed my little ‘problem,’ could’ve made it all better. Truthfully, we probably would’ve fucked, in the end.”

Zayn just stared at him, his cheeks and chin still dancing like he was moments from falling apart entirely.

“But oh well,” Harry shrugged again, finally making his way towards the door. “I didn’t have much more info about your dead best friend and sister anyways. So now the end result is a little flat, but whatever. I'm bored."

In those final moments, Zayn just stood there with his back against the wall, as Harry finished his story. But at the very end, he grabbed Harry’s wrist and pulled hard. He pulled so hard, Harry actually stumbled a bit, his feet catching on the rug, his body falling back into the room like he was as light as a rag doll.

They locked eyes, their chests close, right as Zayn sniffed and blinked the tears away.

“You’re cruel,” Zayn croaked, his voice hoarse. “Do you know? How cruel you are?”

And until that moment, Harry didn’t. Or at least, he had forgotten.

Harry Styles has only ever admitted out loud twice in his life, that he can see and talk to ghosts. And both times, he envisioned the lump of black tar in his chest cavity. He visualized the tangible evil tucked up under his ribcage, the dark mass that if you sliced him open, you’d see it flop out onto the ground at your feet.

 

***

 

Ask any first-semester freshman in college and they’ll tell you how time warps itself in the weirdest of ways. It all at once feels like it’s crawling, each minute bleeding into the next at a snail’s pace, while at the same time flying by at the speed of light. Before you know it, it’s the night before a huge exam, has only been three minutes since you last checked the clock. And then suddenly it’s already fall break, weeks and weeks worth of your life already behind you.

Harry hates the fact that it’s fall break, two days off towards the end of October, because it means he’s distraction-less.

Once Harry laughed in Zayn’s face and ran back to his room, once he looked at himself in the mirror and almost vomited from the sick, disgusting feeling he felt, he piled each distraction on top of the next. Every class, every paper, every extra credit opportunity, got written into his planner. Niall couldn’t help but watch Harry in awe every night he sat at his desk, his laptop and books propped up, highlighters in a rainbow row, pencils in his hair.

“Should I even ask…” Niall asked a few nights into Harry’s manic study session, his hands waving at the mess on Harry’s side of the room, before heading out for a party.

Harry just turned to look at him with wide eyes, suddenly surprised to see another human being speaking to him. It had been days without a conversation. Niall even scrunched his nose a bit, probably at Harry’s unshowered hair and dirty shirt.

Harry blinked at him. He got so wrapped up in himself and the words on each page of his books, he forgot Niall existed.

“And Zayn…” Niall furrowed his brow, at the absence of beautiful man who always seemed to be in the room whenever Harry was.

Harry had seen Zayn twice over the last few days, always from a distance, always staring right at him. It was always jarring, to have Zayn Malik’s eyes on him, so Harry did his best to scurry off before Zayn could look at him too hard. He could lie to Zayn’s face to keep him away, but he couldn’t keep up the asshole “look at how much of a dick I am” charade, not long term. So he couldn’t let Zayn see him.

He couldn’t let Louis see him either. Louis tried to follow him around a few times, hiding behind doorways and in the air vent of his English lecture hall, his piercing blue eyes dancing through the slits in the metal above the professor’s head. Harry’s heart almost burst clean out of his chest that day, from sheer surprise, and the girl next to him asked if he was having a stroke.

He couldn’t let Zayn or Louis or anyone else see him.

He couldn’t let Niall in anymore than he already has, because he didn’t deserve to have any relief from what he did. He didn’t deserve a friend.

“No,” Harry shut the conversation down, turning back to his desk. “That’s done.”

“But you – ”

“Goodnight, Niall.”

Niall left without anything further, shutting the door slightly louder than he normally would.

_Good. If you dislike me, it’s easier._

But now it’s fall break and there’s nothing to study. Harry worked so far ahead, already had his finals mapped out, his notes meticulously planned for when he would need to study for the end of term exams. He wrote a paper that wasn’t due until December. He ran so many miles around campus, he’s pretty sure he saw one of the coaches from the athletic department whisper to a trainer, asking if Harry was an athlete he hadn’t met yet.

Luckily the university offices stay open during fall break, so Harry used it as an excuse to spend time with his mom. He finally showered, kicked back in the lobby of the admissions office with his feet up on the couch and a sucker in his mouth, to read a Stephen King novel on his phone.

Anne vowed not to comment on the sugar, now that he was an adult making adult decisions, but Harry saw her roll her eyes at it as she passed him on the way to her office. They had lunch plans.

There were two young children there in the room with him, playing on the floor, rolling a ball back and forth. Harry almost waved to them, thinking they were the kids of one of Anne’s coworkers. But he realized their clothes were too old, too wet, drenched in water. Their eyes were too sunken in, their bare feet dirty and slightly odd-angled. So he ignored them instead. It was hard to say if another ghost would show up looking for them, so Harry thought it best to pretend it wasn’t a possibility.

An hour later, his eyes begin to droop. Maybe he could take a nap before lunch.

“Are you gonna come play with us?” the little boy interrupts Harry’s thoughts, coughing up at him from the floor.

Harry resolutely does not open his eyes.

“I throw you the ball, and you catch it, and throw it back,” he tries again, his little voice so innocent.

Harry pretends to be asleep, until he actually falls asleep, the children forgotten. Because when he wakes up with his mother’s voice in his ear, they’re gone.

They decide to have lunch at a little café not far from campus, a few sandwiches and a plate of fries split between them. Harry orders a side of barbeque sauce for his panini and Anne rolls her eyes at that as well. He smiles at her like an idiot, even though he doesn’t mean to rub it in her face, all of his new choices. If she only knew the amount of chocolate he currently had in his bag, she’d probably keel over right then and there, and really, Harry rathered his mother not die anytime soon. So he picks at his side salad to make her happy.

“So tell me how things are going. Really,” she says later as she props her chin in her hand, eyes boring into Harry’s.

“Good,” he nods, tossing a napkin to his finished plate.

“Good?”

“Good.”

“And your roommate? Niall, right?”

“He’s good. You’d like him. He’s… funny. And he’s smart. Very into Halloween.”

“I’m sure you love that.”

“We have pumpkins in our room. He let’s me watch ‘The Shining’ when we’re getting ready for bed.”

Anne smiles into her palm. Harry knows it’s from excitement at Harry having a friend who gets him. It’s from the knowledge that Harry can handle himself now. He also knows, because he knows his mother about as well as she does, that she’s thinking of her own mother. She wishes her mother could see Harry now.

A year into Harry’s “episodes,” when the ghosts just wouldn’t let up, after the first rounds of doctors and specialists, Harry heard his mom on the phone one night with her cousin. She was crying. She held her head in her hands, as she admitted to Jimmy that she wished her mom was still alive. Grandma Molly always knew what to do. She would’ve helped Anne through it, she would’ve held Harry close when he cried, when he was so scared, he wouldn’t stop shaking for days. She would’ve been able to stop the bullies from hurting her baby. She would’ve explained to her what Harry meant, when he talked about being afraid of his own bedroom.

He heard Anne say, “I’m not strong enough. And it’s my fault.”

Harry knows it would’ve been easier if his grandma could’ve been there, because he definitely remembers her talking about fairies when he was a child. Balls of light. Dust bunnies. Molly used to tell Anne to watch for them, to tell her if they kept playing with Harry in his nursery. Harry suspects his “gift” lays somewhere in his DNA, tied to his mother’s side somehow.

But then Grandma Molly could never help Harry through it. She died and must’ve moved right on, because to this day, Harry has never been visited by her.

Harry reaches for Anne’s hand and holds tight, to smile at her. He wants her to have this.

“Niall is the best. My best friend,” Harry lies.

“And that other boy?” Anne smiles through the influx of tears in her eyes. “The one with the black hair I saw you walking with all those times?”

Harry’s body tenses up.

“I didn’t mean to spy, I promise. But you can’t blame me, you always walked near my office. And he looked at you like you were the sun,” she wiggled her eyebrows a little.

 _No,_ he _was the sun. A whole slice of it just for me._

“That wasn’t anything,” Harry shakes his head with a small sigh.

“You sure about that?”

“Yeah.”

“Someone should’ve told him so.”

“I did,” Harry pulled his hands back so he could sit on them. “I eventually did.”

“That’s a shame. I had… a good feeling about him.”

“Yeah,” Harry shrugged it off. Anne got feelings sometimes, and the good ones always made Harry nervous. It was just another way to be let down.

“Well, I’m sure whatever boy you end up with will be amazing. I’m sure he’ll change everything.”

Harry looked up at her questioningly, his eyes nervous.

“That’s what ‘the one’ does. They change everything, baby,” Anne winked. “Every problem, every obstacle you think the universe has thrown your way, every bad day. Well… suddenly they don’t seem so big and scary. They change how you see it all. Your perspective.”

Harry sat with that for awhile, as his mom blabbered on about work and his cousin Matt, before eventually pulling him up by the hands to walk her back to the office.

Zayn saw them heading into the admin building, with Safaa over one shoulder and Louis over the other. The sun was in his eyes, so his face was all contorted, standing stock still in a plaid shirt and ripped jeans. He was still beautiful though, swirled in cigarette smoke and Safaa’s light.

Harry gripped his mom’s hand tighter and turned away before he could stare at Zayn right back.

 

***

 

It happens minutes later in the men’s restroom on the second floor of that building. After saying goodbye to his mom, Harry stands at the sink to wash his hands after taking a piss, when suddenly his body goes flying backwards, a good five feet, into the tiled wall. His head smacks into it, practically cracking in two, and he sees stars. He gets the wind knocked out of him, can barely breathe as his chest tries to catch up to the sudden trauma.

Harry can’t see anything, just blinding white lights bursting in front of his face, his entire body trembling as his adrenal glands chug into gear, sending adrenaline and aldosterone and epinephrine to his extremities.

It’s like he’s been shot, his lungs constricting, his legs almost too weak to keep him standing.

“You,” a woman sneers in his face suddenly, their noses a centimeter apart.

Harry finally exhales, can finally breathe, as he takes it in. He tries to grab for something, his hands scrambling at the cold wall behind him, but it’s no use. He’s pinned.

“No, I – ”

“You were supposed to be watching them!” she screams, the strings of her bonnet swinging to and fro.

“No – ”

“You were supposed to watch them! You weren’t supposed to fall asleep!”

Belatedly, Harry senses the two children to his right, stock still as they stare at him, their ball long forgotten. They’re still sopping wet, soaked from head to toe, the tips of their little fingers raw and bloody, worn down to the bone. He hadn’t noticed before.

“I’m sorry,” Harry gasps, right as her hands make their way around his throat.

“Why can’t you ever do as you’re told?” she hisses, her fingernails digging into Harry’s skin.

Harry knows it’s not his fault that those kids fell down a well a hundred years before, and he knows he can’t be blamed for the hours they spent trying to scratch and crawl their way out of it. But when he gets caught like this, in some sort of loop within the ghost’s realm of possibility, in some other timeline, he sort of feels like it is.

So as Mary Ellen chokes the life out of him, he doesn’t try to fight back. His arms and legs go limp, as the light in that old bathroom grows smaller and smaller, until it’s nothing but a pin prick.

He hates when it’s dead kids. They never go peacefully. They always seem to be the ones to suffer the most.

 

***

 

The walk back to his dorm is a slow one. When Harry came to on the floor of the bathroom hours later, he had a deep cut on his face, scratches all over his body, and a fucked up ankle.

He limps along cobblestone paths as the sun sets, fall leaves crunching under his feet. He pulls his coat close to his body and keeps on. The temperature drops so quickly when the sun isn’t there to combat it.

He limps, but with his normal purpose. Point A to Point B.

Campus is quiet and no one waves to say hello.

For that, Harry is grateful.

 

***

 

The room is crowded when Harry finally shuffles in well after dinner time, a girl with cuts all over her wrists, a military man in uniform with half his face gone, a little girl with tight braids holding a doll, a kid who looks a lot like Niall peeking out at Harry from his closet. Harry finds himself cursing up a storm as the little group all stand there staring at him, wishing he could be fucking alone for once.

“Can I have a fucking _minute_ , Jesus Christ,” Harry throws a boot to the floor in anger, shutting his eyes as he limps to his desk. “Can you all just _leave me alone?_ ”

“Do you know Andile Peni?” one asks, trying to give Harry the name of a loved one.

“I don’t know why I’m here,” another says through their tears.

“S’your name? Why do we come to you?”

Harry puts his hands over his ears once he reaches his desk, eyes still shut so tight, he starts to see swirls of color. His breath comes out so cold, so fucking frigid, it’s a wonder it doesn’t freeze in thin air. They pepper him with more questions, one more even joins in, another man from the depths of the old university.

They don’t stop.

“Hello?”

“Why… Can you see?”

“Shut the fuck _up_ ,” Harry hears himself respond. “Shut up. Shut up. Shut up.”

They move around him, behind him, shifting and circling, their energies all converging into something bigger, something heavy. Harry’s lungs become clouded, full of smoke.

“Harry?” he hears from Niall’s side of the room.

Harry whips around so fast, he almost falls. It’s Niall. He had been there the whole time at his own desk, in comfortable sweats, one socked foot tucked up under himself, his phone in his hand.

The pumpkins Harry and Zayn carved weeks before have their candles lit, sending shadows from the windowsill across both of their shocked faces. White as sheets. The color drained from their cheeks.

“Are you okay?”

“Yeah.”

“Are you lying?”

“Probably,” Harry admits.

Harry blinks and suddenly they’re alone. The room feels lighter as Niall gets up and steps to him, reaches a hand to Harry’s jaw to see the slice in his cheek. Niall frowns until the lines in his face are as deep as valleys as he gently moves Harry’s head to inspect. Bruises on Harry’s neck. More cuts on his shoulders and chest, peeking out of the cardigan he threw on that afternoon.

“Who were you just talking to?” Niall says as he moves his hand to Harry’s shoulder. “Just now? Before you knew I was here?”

Harry’s chin shakes as Niall takes it in and files it away fast as anything.

“Nobody.”

Niall tilts his head.

“Where’s Zayn?”

“I don’t know,” Harry answers honestly, holding onto Niall’s hand now. He grips it hard, so fucking hard, it must hurt.

“Why?”

Harry shrugs.

“He got mad at Sabrina,” Niall nods like he finally understands something. “He got really fucking mad at her.”

“Oh.”

“He couldn’t believe she betrayed him. Couldn’t fathom why she’d tell you, a complete stranger to her, about his past. He got mad at me, too.”

Harry suddenly feels the breath he’s been holding leave his lungs, out through his nose before he can stop it. A calmness settles in his bones, his muscles shot up with morphine, so tired and aching, it’s a wonder he can stand.

And that’s how he knows they’re there.

“You should let him in,” Louis whispers from somewhere Harry can’t place, somewhere not quite physical in the room, but in the room nonetheless. Saf twinkles subdued and bright all at once, somewhere, Harry can feel her.

Harry cries. He feels the tears spilling hot down his cheeks before he can even figure out where they came from.

“But Sabrina never told you anything. No one did. Did they,” Niall brings him back, with a firm grip to both arms now.

“No,” Harry whispers, giving up. He shakes with a sob. “No one told me.”

Louis and Saf don’t leave just yet, they keep close as Harry falls against Niall’s chest. Niall holds Harry tight in an embrace. He feels it warming him from the inside out, as he cries and cries, with Louis over one shoulder and Safaa over the other.

No other ghosts show up.

 

***

 

That night and into the next day, with no classes on the horizon, Harry learns a few things from Niall.

If you scrape the cream from inside an Oreo with your teeth, as opposed to licking it like the people in the commercials do, it’s way more satisfying.

Chocolate milkshakes are good, but chocolate malts are better.

If you roll a piece of wrapped chocolate between your hands and sing the chorus of “Stayin’ Alive” three times through, it’s melted _just_ enough when you peel into it.

Niall says Red Vines are only good when used as straws in glasses of ice cold soda, preferably Dr. Pepper, but Coke will do in a bind.

Harry sucks four pixie sticks in a row, the paper gross and wet on his tongue, as the bite of the sour candy rushes straight to his brain. Niall reminds him to embrace the sting.

Baby Butterfingers are a thousand times better than regular-sized Butterfingers. Hands down.

Niall is a good distraction. Not quite the best, but a good one. A good fucking friend. Harry feels the urge to reach out and hold his hand once or twice, but he doesn't. It's good the way it is. Niall hugs him a few times though, which Harry always melts right into.

Harry learns that Niall knows when to say a lot without saying much at all.

“Do you like strawberry?” Niall asks well after midnight, as they lay on Harry’s bed side by side, passing the pumpkin lollipop Zayn gave him back and forth. He has to elbow Harry as he asks the question.

“Yeah,” Harry nods, his eyes getting heavier. “Of course.”

“Strawberry milkshakes for breakfast, then. We’ll dip pancakes into them, you’ll see. It’s fucking amazing.”

“Okay,” Harry tucks his chin to his shoulder, exhaling in exhaustion.

Harry starts to fall asleep right as Niall takes the lollipop from his hand a final time, with a brush of his fingers along Harry’s wrist. He tucks Harry in, makes sure the blanket is securely around his frigid feet, and gingerly makes his way to his own bed.

And the next morning, over pancakes and milkshakes at Niall’s favorite restaurant, when Harry laughs so hard he has the sugary dairy product coming out of his nose, he imagines what Zayn would say if he could see it.

 

***

 

It’s almost overwhelming to have someone know. Harry doesn’t really know what to do with himself now that he could look over at Niall, at any given moment of any given day and simply say, “Hey there’s a ghost in the room.”

Not that he does, of course.

“So here’s the thing,” Niall scrubs at his face with his hands, in nothing but his boxers near his dresser. “I don’t… I just, I feel like we need to set some ground rules.”

“Okay,” Harry nods, pulling on a sweater from his bed, suddenly freezing.

“It’s just… they can show up at any time, yeah?”

“Pretty much.”

“Shit, even when you’re like, in the shower? Or jerking off?”

“Jesus,” Harry chuckles, rubbing his hands together. “I mean, yeah. I’ve felt a few near me while I showered. But they go away eventually. Or I run somewhere else.”

Niall quirks an eyebrow at him playfully.

“I jerked off in the bathroom of our gym once,” Harry shrugs with a laugh. That time, some strange women peeked at him from the bushes outside his bedroom window, right as he went to stick his hands down his pants. So yes, he told his mother he wanted to go to the gym, even though it was ten at night.

Niall laughs at him so hard, this idiot he’s befriended, he has to throw a Skittle at Harry’s face. It hits him, hard, right there on his cheek where the cut has scabbed over, so he throws it right back at Niall. He ducks it, the bastard.

“No, stop distracting me,” Niall waves a hand. “I just… I don’t want to know. Not… always. Like, if it’s bad or one feels scary, or threatening, if it’s really fucking bad… you can tell me.”

Harry nods like he’s in class, using his eyes to show he understands.

“But if one just shows up to chill on the floor while we study, or if it’s especially creepy… don’t hate me if I don’t always want to know.”

“That’s more than fair,” Harry says as he stands up to give Niall a hug. He can’t help but whisper, “Thanks for not thinking I’m a freak. And sorry for how cold it’s been.”

“Never,” Niall says into Harry’s hair, spitting around it. “And I have socks. Don’t you worry about me.”

Harry feels Niall’s right hand brush over his shoulder blade, where some of the nastier cuts sit. He pulls back rather quickly, and Harry knows it’s hard for him, to see and feel the evidence so close. He still won’t stare at the purple and yellow bruises all along Harry’s neck, not for long. He really is Harry’s friend now, for better or worse, and it warms Harry from deep in his chest.

Harry begins to pull away, to head to his desk to begin reading even further ahead for his history class the next day, when Niall tuts at him.

“Not so fast, buddy,” he pinches Harry’s arm a little. “Do you think you’re finished?”

“With what?” Harry scoffs.

“Saying your thank yous and sorrys?”

Harry frowns.

“The party is Saturday,” Niall steps to his closet, to finally get dressed. “If you’re not sucking his dick by then, or at _least_ just friends again, I swear to God.”

“He hates me.”

“Please,” Niall rolls his eyes dramatically.

“He _really_ hates me.”

“He’s mad at you. There’s a difference. And don’t you think you owe him the truth? You talked to his family, Haz. In his own fucking bedroom. Don’t you want to… help him, maybe?”

Harry hadn’t considered that. He pinches his bottom lip between his fingers, the blood rushing so fast it turns bright red. He’s never talked to a ghost as much as he talked to Louis, who was so real and lucid and understanding. He didn’t warp Harry’s space or steal his heat. He talked to Harry like they were old friends. He gave Harry advice. _Say you’re sorry. Buy him a Big Mac._

Louis also said he was Zayn’s very best friend. And maybe Zayn should hear it firsthand how much Louis loves him.

And how happy Safaa is to be near him.

“He won’t want to talk to me,” Harry shakes his head. It’s no use either way. “I can’t… I wouldn’t be able to forgive me, if it were the other way around.”

“You won’t know unless you try.”

Harry deflates a little, as he sits at his desk.

“And either way, you’re coming with me tomorrow night to start decorating, so get your shit together,” Niall smirks, throwing another yellow Skittle at Harry’s head. “And bring ducktape.”

The Skittle gets stuck in Harry’s hair and he doesn’t even notice.

 

***

 

The fall semester break ends in a swirl of color. Sure, the first day of fall comes somewhere in September, but it doesn’t actually feel like it in Pennsylvania until about mid October. The world outside becomes crisper, steeped in oranges, reds, and golden browns. Fall means crunching leaves and geese heading south, pop-up Halloween outlets, aisles and aisles of orange and black decorations, no matter what store you find yourself in. It’s ciders and pies, swapping recipes for November’s Thanksgiving tables, the roar of the football stadium, full of people with their fingers damn near freezing off from the cold, and swiftly ignoring it. It’s ghouls and goblins, All Hallow’s Eve, pumpkins grinning from old withered front stoops.

It’s Harry’s favorite season.

Harry loves this time of year. He remembers being seven, long before the ghosts arrived, holding his mom’s hand some mornings before she took him to school, lazily strolling along Kelly Drive, behind the art museum. It’s still the most picturesque place Harry can think of. Sloping lawns, the water line, couples kissing on benches, the Remington cowboy sculpture surrounded by plush trees. Sometimes Anne would get Harry a “candied apple” from the health food store near their apartment, so he could walk and munch at the same time, tucked safely by her side. She said it was a treat. Harry now knows that his ridiculous mother never really got him anything candied, and that they were only ever beautiful, ripe apples stuck on popsicle sticks, no candy to be had.

But even now, with his sweet tooth practically screaming at him at all hours of the day, Harry thinks the sweetest, most delicious thing he’s ever eaten were those apples. There’s nothing quite like a crisp apple in the fall.

An apple. Harry’s favorite food.

Harry weaves his way across campus that Friday morning, the day before Niall’s big Halloween party, and remembers those early fall mornings fondly. He focuses on the swishing of his black Under Armour pants as he runs down Locust, his ankle wrapped and only slightly throbbing, as he darts between hungover co-eds coming back from their late night parties and hook ups. He even waves to a few. He comes upon one of Sabrina’s friends, one of the girls who came to their dorm room that one night, and she rolls her eyes at him.

Harry tilts his head down a bit, ashamed, as he sprints past her, past rows and rows of flaming red trees. He should probably apologize to Sabrina too, for the position he put her in with Zayn. He’ll have to add her to his list. He’s made a small checklist in his mind of things he needs to do and say with Zayn, how he needs to approach the situation going forward. So really, adding Zayn’s roommate to it shouldn’t be much trouble.

After all, the hard part is going to be convincing Zayn to look him in the eye again. Harry huffs and puffs, pushes himself harder, sprints towards a row of small eateries, to get a whiff of any bread baking.

He catches sight of various shadows, as his feet pound the pavement along Walnut, so he does what he always does and cuts to the smaller side streets whenever it feels too ominous. The night before, Niall had said their room felt colder than normal, and it didn’t go unnoticed by Harry. The air felt charged this morning, like an electrical current was thrumming somewhere within the haze. Harry feels energies almost every day, in various forms, whether it be his body tingling, his hands sizzling, his hair crackling.

And maybe it was just in his head, but Harry felt something different today. Something odd. Like something was coming.

There wasn’t an active threat, no one was technically chasing him, but as Harry finished up his run, it sort of felt like it. Maybe the holiday was messing with his head, the two paper bags on his bed holding his costume taunting him.

Harry hadn’t done it in awhile, but he couldn’t help it: before he could get comfortable in the room or get in the shower, before he could wrap his head around the coming days, he checked the closet, under his bed, and behind the curtains.

Just in case.

 

***

 

Luckily Niall Horan let him be that night, as he shuffled out of their dorm room with two massive boxes in his hands. He only complained a little, as Harry stacked one on top of the other and smacked his ass on the way out the door. Niall could be heard grumbling about taking all of the decorations by himself to the house, as he kicked at the elevator button with his boot, but he at least kept it quiet.

He knew Harry needed to show up to Zayn’s house on his own time.

So Harry acted like a huge fucking baby about it, and paced their room, clicking and snapping his fingers over and over, just to make a sound.

Suddenly she’s there, blinking near the window overlooking cracked cobblestones and hoards of freshmen frolicking about for the night. She twinkles a bit, bobbing from side to side, and Harry can’t help but envision a little girl holding her dress, hopping from foot to foot. Maybe she would’ve been a good ballerina.

And that’s what makes Harry grab his phone and keys. It’s what brings him back into the room five seconds later to swipe for his wallet, with stiff, numb fingers.

Safaa was the reason Harry got close to Zayn in the first place, the little Jiminy Cricket on his shoulder nudging them together. She surged so forcefully, so powerfully that first night in Harry’s room, they ended up holding on for dear life. She knew even then, that Harry works better with Zayn’s warmth between his palms.

And even if it’s not meant to be, even if Zayn was the one to say they were never friends, maybe they could be. Maybe Harry could finally do it: exist in a world where it’s not just him and his secrets. He could have Niall and his classes and his running times, with bruises around his neck if it happens, when he can’t stop it, but maybe he can have people to complain about it to.

Maybe he doesn’t have to be Henry from “The Twilight Zone,” pushing and pushing until there’s no one left. Maybe Harry can be the guy Zayn saw from the beginning: weird and quiet, but sweet and goofy when he wants to be. He used to make Zayn laugh, and that’s something. Maybe he’ll never win an award for it, but maybe Zayn’s the only prize he needs.

Maybe Zayn did watch Harry get locked away, and maybe Harry did throw it in his face as a defense mechanism. And maybe Harry thinks about shit too long and too hard, without ever taking action, just running for the hills before he can ask himself why.

Maybe Zayn pulls Harry back, when a shadow blocks the light, and maybe Harry can do the same for Zayn. Maybe Harry never deserved his gift, maybe he’s punished himself enough. Maybe he should just be a normal college student, a new person, someone who can hold a hand and a heart and whatever else Zayn can’t carry on his shoulders any longer.

Maybe Harry just has to fucking _try_.

“Thanks Saf,” he mumbles as he takes the stairs two at a time.

It all goes quite smoothly after that. Harry texts Niall to say he’s on his way, but has to make a pit stop first.

Fifteen minutes later, Harry steps into a McDonald’s for the first time and orders two Big Macs. And a large fry to split.

 

***

 

Harry grips the thin paper bag as he makes his way up Zayn’s front walk and purposefully ignores the dead people staring at him from both yards to his left and right. This old neighborhood just can’t be good for Harry’s health, he decides, as his breath shudders between his lips. He loses feeling in his toes completely, his nipples hard as rocks beneath his sweater and peacoat. But Safaa keeps close, bobbing just over his right shoulder.

The houses bursts with so much noise and energy, Harry doesn’t bother knocking. He just walks in and tries to duck quickly, before a flying whiffle ball catches him in the eye socket, the guy who threw it jostling him as he runs down the back hallway. Girls in sweatpants jump around him, their hands full of fake cobwebs and plastic body parts. A guy actually sits on another guy’s shoulders in the living room, to hang blood-red lights over the front window Harry once saw a ghost hit with his palm.

If it’s this fun and high-energy just to decorate the house for the party, Harry can’t help but laugh to himself thinking about the _actual_ party in only a few hours’ time.

Harry tries to ask two of Zayn’s roommates where he is, but someone turns up a Drake song from what seems to be a surround-sound stereo, the music booming so loudly from every single room, the bass actually shakes the foundation. A girl upstairs yells down that it’s playing from the landing, as planned, and Harry is reminded yet again that the house is full of ridiculously intelligent people like Zayn. Engineering majors, architects, future scientists. The house feels as if it’s beating like one giant throbbing heart, and Harry can’t decide, as he turns in a circle to take it in, if he likes it all that much.

He gets that ominous feeling again.

Just then, Sabrina and Niall come down the huge staircase to Harry’s left, smoothing their shirts and hair somewhat. Harry winks at Niall, the bastard, even though his early grumblings about having to go alone were for absolutely nothing.

“Bastard,” Harry hip checks him, lips at Niall’s ear.

Niall laughs, before quickly schooling his face to be more serious, nodding towards Sabrina.

She’s not impressed.

“Harry,” she says blankly, crossing her arms.

“Hey,” Harry tries to step to her, a hand extended to touch her arm, to apologize, to smile and beg for forgiveness.

But she holds her hand out instead.

“It’s not –” she grimaces, not sure how to finish the sentence, clearly not in a hugging mood.

Harry’s cheeks flame as red as the trees outside.

“You said some shit to my best friend, and made him think I betrayed him. You were a dick,” she says to Harry as she steps towards Niall. “I have no idea why, and truthfully, it feels really pathetic to hold that kind of grudge after all these years.”

Harry opens his mouth, but decides to shut it again.

“But Ni says you’re _not_ a dick, and that you have your reasons for trying to… I don’t know, keep Zayn away from you or whatever. But I still say you can go fuck yourself, so.”

Niall bites his lip to keep from smiling, clearly enthralled at his sort-of-girlfriend’s massive balls and gusto. He still steps between them though, just in case.

“If you fuck with him again,” Sabrina puts her hands on her slim hips, her hair sticking to her forehead slightly, “I’ll cut your dick off myself.”

Harry and Niall both squawk at that, which then makes Sabrina crack a smile to Niall, and flip off Harry, right as another wiffle ball goes flying past them near the base of the stairs. Four massive guys come barreling down after it, with fake skeletons and tombstones above their heads, yelling about the front yard being too bare.

“Cross my heart,” Harry says with a nod, crossing his finger over his chest.

Sabrina only crosses her arms then, clearly not ready to forgive Niall’s asshole of a roommate.

Niall grabs for the back of her neck, to turn her head slightly, so he can kiss her. They have some weird half-conversation, with their mouths almost connected, mumbling sweet nothings. Or Sabrina talking shit about Harry while Niall tried to shush her. One or the other.

Safaa gets bored then, and starts hovering near the middle of the stairs.

“Sorry, but… can I?” Harry points up them expectantly, the McDonald’s bag crinkled almost beyond repair, swinging precariously between them.

“Oh, he’s not here.”

Both Niall and Harry give her a dumbfounded look.

“What?” she shrugs. “I didn’t know you were coming. He went home right after class this morning and won’t be back until the start of the party tomorrow.”

Niall tries to show his sympathy by quickly slapping Harry’s cheek, while shrugging, before he follows Sabrina towards the kitchen to start the drink mixing. He starts yelling out instructions, since he found a bunch of “recipes” online for trash-can-sized booze concoctions, which are “just as important” as the creepy decorations. So Harry knows it’s his dismissal, his out, his excuse to throw the fast food away and slink home by himself. He could bounce and no one would notice, least of all Niall who had just been laid and had to organize an entire party.

But Safaa twinkles to Harry from the stairs, so he follows her up them, all the way to Zayn’s room.

His door is closed this time, but Harry still doesn’t hesitate. He reaches for the handle and listens as it creaks open, as creepy and disturbing as a haunted house sound effect, to see the room as disheveled as before. It’s all bathed in moonlight, his clothes and books in piles on the floor, his unmade bed, about five different ashtrays scattered across every surface.

Harry gently sets the McDonald’s bag onto Zayn’s desk, even though it’ll be disgusting by the time Zayn sees it. _I think I just want him to see it_ , Harry shrugs to himself, shoving his hands in his pockets.

“Took you long enough,” Louis mutters from somewhere over Harry’s shoulder.

“Sorry,” Harry turns to him, as he waltzes in, the same as every other time Harry has seen him.

Shorts and a tank top. Bare feet, absolutely filthy on the bottom, Saf right alongside him. Harry watches him nod towards Zayn’s bed.

“He’ll be back soon.”

“Okay.”

“And then you’ll tell him everything, right?”

“I think so. I think it’s time.”

“Good.”

“Yeah,” Harry nods, curling his hands in his pockets into fists.

Louis comes to stand with him like the last time, close but far enough away, as they both silently turn to look out the window towards the front yard.

A dozen ghosts, some so gruesome and otherwordly, Harry shivers. All adults, all in modern clothing, ones who have been following him for days and days, a few angry, a few so dead they can’t even think. Eyes eyes eyes, on Harry, waiting, expecting him. It’s like Harry’s spine wants nothing more than to escape the confines of his body entirely. Louis frowns as his eyes land on each of them, taking it in as Harry would, in horror and surprise. It never gets old.

“He might have a hard time with it,” Louis says, as if he’s choosing his words carefully. “So if you need my help, just ask.”

“Okay.”

“And if… if he cries at all, or gets emotional, don’t… don’t like, watch him too close. Pretend like he’s not. Just pretend like he’s fine and talking to you normally.”

Harry turns to look at him.

“He doesn’t like to cry. He thinks it makes him weak,” Louis says, without looking at Harry.

“Okay,” Harry nods, face serious.

“Okay,” Louis nods to match.

They end up looking out the window for a long time, until each ghost dissipates into someplace else, someplace Harry can’t understand or see or touch.

 

***

 

Zayn’s mouth. Hot and sweet. Thousands, maybe millions, of different tastes all at once. A kiss for every nerve ending, every hair, every cell to explode with at the same time. Harry has kissed people, a dozen of them, when he tried so many things in high school, on those weekends he took a break from his real life: the ghosts and taking care of his mom and studying. He touched and was touched, came in his jeans and in a boy’s hand, kissed the moans out of a pair of lungs, when drunk and then sober. Kisses to make a man pray afterwards.

But none of those touches were as beautiful as the kiss Zayn planted on him out in the sun that one day, before class, like it was as natural as breathing.

It’s Harry singular focus as he sways from side to side, sweating through his costume.

Niall didn’t make Harry go to the party early, thank God. He saw how bummed out Harry had been after coming out of Zayn’s room the night before, his shoulders hunched at Zayn’s silent brush off. It was a night Zayn knew Harry would be around, to help with the party preparations, and he chose to go stay at his parents’ house, at their fancy mansion over in Chestnut Hill. He saw Harry coming and going since the night Harry cruelly threw Louis and Safaa at him, and clearly wanted to keep their separation permanent. Harry can’t really say he’s surprised, or even upset about it. It’s not fair for Harry to be the one hurting.

So Harry watched Niall leave hours before sun down, in his Dead Prince Charming costume, to match Sabrina’s Dead Cinderella idea. Harry had helped him apply the fake gashes to his neck and face, applied the fake blood to his temples, corners of his eyes, and a trickle from his mouth. Niall had already dirtied up the beautiful white coat and trousers he said his dad wouldn’t even notice missing from his tux collection, so it looked perfect. A true dead prince.

Harry got ready alone. He carefully pulled on his skin-tight black jeans, wrapped himself in the black button up and white lace jabot, with the silk black vest on top. Harry can admit he was pretty proud of the black cloak with blood red lining he found in an antique shop, how when he flapped it just right, whipped it across himself in the mirror, it came off as quite menacing.

“Scary,” a girl whispered from under Niall’s bed, only her gray, decaying fingers visible, creeping out to scratch at the floor.

Harry ignored not only her, but the jump in his throat, the tightening of his stomach from being caught off guard. The finishing touch was the hat. He found it in the same shop as he found the cloak, a classic antique top hat with a thin black ribbon tied around the base. If he tilted it down just so, his hair hanging limp in front of his ears and along his neck, you could hardly see Harry’s face at all.

That was the goal when he walked to the party a little before midnight, to keep himself unseen. If he couldn’t see the ghosts, if he didn’t look up at them, maybe they didn’t exist tonight. He looked good. Scary and dark, a man on a mission. Maybe in another life Harry was a thief in the night, a man who creeped in the shadows to not be seen, a knife tucked in his boot and a smile on his face. He looked perfect.

Jack the Ripper.

Niall agreed, yelled right at him as he stepped onto Sabrina’s uneven wooden porch hours before. The entire house was bathed in red. The boys who lived in the attic set up lights all along the base of the house, with red lightbulbs, sending shadows across the old, warped wood from the 1800s. Harry looked up and saw the lamps in each of the front-facing windows, with red shades and red handkerchiefs thrown over the tops of them. A makeshift graveyard near the porch. A corpse in the bushes. Blood spatters on the windows.

It was like every person enrolled at UPENN was there, like thousands of people crowded into one booming mansion, the party in full swing. Harry and Niall surveyed the main floor, their eyes scanning the crowd, Harry practically slurping the energy out of the room with a straw. He could feel Zayn close by. He just knew. _Why do I keep missing you?_

Zombies and ghosts, witches and demented med students in blood soaked scrubs. Princesses, slutty pumpkins, a guy in nothing but a thong. A few beautiful vampires. A disgusting clown. Harry chuckled as three of Zayn and Sabrina’s roommates passed, one handing him an orange plastic cup, as three different versions of Tom Cruise: Top Gun, Risky Business, and A Few Good Men.

Niall told him how most of the living room, dancing near the decks his DJ friend Siobhan set up, were all rolling. Harry could tell, could see how they all touched each other, girls with their fingers running up arms and along necks, two guys making out, a group of half-naked girls who had pulled the tops of their Power Ranger costumes down to their waists. The kitchen was one big bar, people mixing drinks on every surface. Beer pong in the dining room. About a thousand different conversations in every room of the house, laughter and screams. Spooks and ghouls jumping out of closets, squeals of delight. Costumes everywhere, all of them deciding for one night to let their walls down, no judgements or pretenses.

Harry fucking loves Halloween.

He thought it over and over as he wandered the house, first with Niall leading the way, and then on his own. He would never know, if he didn’t ask himself the question, if any of these people were dead. No ghosts, no scares, no dead toddlers without their mothers or withered old men reliving Vietnam in his face.

The only ghosts Harry could see were the ones with smeared white makeup covering beautifully alive skin.

Just bodies and sweat, the tequila mix in his cup, his hat tipped in front of his eyes and his black cloak floating behind him like a breeze. The music and people, the energy bursting from within the house, it was like Harry was standing inside a hurricane. Right in the eye of it.

They were all feeling the same emotion at the same time: true elation. A collective “we’re in this scary house together, ignoring our own demons and worst fears, to instead dress as them and point a finger right in their faces.”

He looked for Zayn. He really did. Every room Harry stepped into, every girl that grabbed his hand and asked how he was, every guy who hugged him, people who recognized him or commented on his Jack the Ripper costume. Every person he encountered, he found himself wondering, “Are you friends with him? Do you know where he is?”

But Harry kept his mouth shut and played along. He partied. He drank until his lips went numb and a bead of sweat trickled down his back. That was always a good sign. Numbness and sweat. Niall hugged him so many times, every time they crossed paths, and whispered, “We ain’t afraid of no ghosts, are we, Haz?” Harry laughed into his neck, the tickle of tequila and lime making everything so much funnier. It wasn’t until Sabrina tugged him into a hug, one of those hugs that don’t mean much when sober. They’d probably never be friends, after what Harry did, but a Dead Cinderella and a Jack the Ripper can embrace for minutes at a time, can’t they.

She whispered to him that Zayn kept sidestepping out of the room, any time Harry entered it. And Harry knew it was true, since Zayn had been side stepping him ever since the night Harry smiled at him with malice and cruelty practically dripping down his chin.

“You’re a dick. But he’s the Arrow,” she slurred a bit, lips against Harry’s ear. “It’s his favorite. Go tell him what you gotta tell him. Go find him.”

So Harry did. He handed his drink to a Miss America and searched through the crowd, past the masks and face paint and dried blood. He caught the flash of a green and black hood a few times, always too far away, always two steps ahead, as the lights and music swirled around him. A smoke machine sputtered somewhere, the dry ice in buckets along the stairs sending a haze over the stained glass windows and people tripping out of bedrooms.

But then Harry gave up. Zayn didn’t want to be found. Zayn didn’t want him after all of it. And if Zayn wanted to ignore what they were, like Harry did for all those weeks every time Zayn tried to touch him, then he can. Harry decided for one night not to wallow in it. To enjoy himself. He ran for so many years, from happiness and friends and human connection, it was a night to take it back.

So Harry comes down from being drunk, just on the edge of still tipsy, as he dances in the living room with all those random people. He threw his hat and cloak off a few minutes into it, too hot and flushed in the mass of people. They roll around him, high as kites with blown pupils and candy lips, as sweat drips down Harry’s neck towards his fancy shirt and vest.

It’s just Harry inside his own head, ghost-less, dancing, thoughts on only Zayn’s mouth. Hot and sweet. That taste of his. The boy who tried to fix the thermostat and got angry at Harry for signing up for a credit card without talking to him about it first. The one who carved a pumpkin to resemble Harry. The one Harry will have to convince he’s not crazy, the one he needs to lay his cards out for. The only one who matters.

Hot and sweet. That’s Zayn, isn’t it.

He dances to all kinds of music, his hands in the air, laughing every so often, the entire house on fire. A girl rubs her ass against his dick, a red wig flying around her, and it feels so good, Harry doesn’t even move away from it right away.

And that’s when they lock eyes, as Harry hears Siobhan yell out for everyone to clap their hands over and over, to some beat as it climbs, faster and faster. Zayn Malik watches him from the front entryway. He has his Arrow hood up, an almost perfect replica of the TV show’s costume, his eyes blacked out from makeup. Bare arms, tattoos on display, a bow slung over his back.

Harry can’t figure out if it’s another occasion of Zayn just watching him afar. It could be fascination at this point, at the spectacle of Harry The Mystery. It could be out of anger, just to prove to himself that he hates Harry for what he did. Harry stills only slightly, as more people press into him the later it gets, the hotter the temperature rises. Harry can feel every extremity when it’s this hot, and he wants to take a nap with it. Maybe Zayn just wants to watch for a minute, before leaving the room again.

Harry watches Zayn right back, through the room bathed in red and smoke, as he leans against a wooden pillar covered in cobwebs. He lifts a hand to his mouth. But he doesn’t have a cup, he doesn’t take a drink of anything.

He sticks a sour strawberry belt in his mouth.

The bite must get to him, the sour tang rushing over his tongue, because he grimaces. And then he walks out of the room, through the people, away away away.

Harry deflates. His body sags. He should go home. Halloween is almost over anyways, the lights could come on at any time, cops could show up to bust it. Maybe before it gets worse, or Harry feels the weight of it, he could leave before he’s left. He starts to turn, to look for his cloak and hat, when he sees him.

Through the smokey haze, Harry catches another set of eyes. And those eyes speak to him as if he has a speaker inside his very brain.

_So that’s it? Just gonna roll over and take it? What did I tell you?_

Louis doesn’t breathe anymore, but he sure does huff an exasperated breath when he wants to, tapping at an imaginary watch on his wrist, his disgusting bare foot stomping on the floor near the staircase. He glares at Harry and then disappears.

Harry finds himself chasing after both of them, through hoards of people, the house suddenly even more full than before. It’s almost suffocating, and Harry is reminded of being stuck in a small space again. He uses his elbows to maneuver through the dresses and cardboard and plastic light sabers. Up the stairs, through the whole house, yelling out a name no one can hear.

He bursts into Zayn’s room, his lungs constricting slightly, to find Zayn hunched over, sitting on the radiator near the window. He doesn’t even look over at Harry or the noise, until Harry slams the door shut to block it out some. Zayn just smokes a cigarette, his hood still up, the makeup around his eyes slightly smudged.

“Hey,” Harry huffs a breath, stepping closer.

“You left food on my desk. And it got really fucking gross.”

“Sorry.”

Zayn levels him with a look. _So that’s what you’re sorry for?_

“We need to talk.”

“Do we?”

“Yeah.”

“You said enough the last time you were here,” Zayn turns to the window again, to blow out smoke into the night air.

“And you know that was all bullshit, don’t you,” Harry tilts his chin down, like he did all those weeks ago in Zayn’s very living room, when he tried to _will_ Zayn into remembering him.

“I don’t know anything.”

“Yes you do,” Harry says, a shake to his voice. “You know something is up with me, I know you do. I’ve seen you watching me.”

Harry thinks Zayn won’t ever speak to him again, as he watches him not react at all. He inhales smoke, exhales it. Twice. Just sits at his window, surveying the crowded front yard where a girl shrieks as her boyfriend chases her.

So he has the thought again that he should go home. Harry figures he should end it there, give up, go away. At least he has Niall.

But then fast as anything, Zayn is up and off the radiator, shoving Harry so hard, he stumbles back towards the closet.

“I don’t know _anything_ , you fucking prick,” he practically shouts. “Because you never say anything. You – you go off into your own head, or somewhere else, you stare at walls and into empty rooms. You fucking talk to yourself, or someone, or whoever.”

Louis was right. Zayn was going to have a hard time with this.

So Harry tries to reach for him, to touch him somehow. Zayn dodges his touch and holds up a hand.

“Fuck you.”

“Zayn.”

“I asked myself if you were like, a psychic or something. Or maybe you can read minds, or tell the future, or read people and know where they come from. Maybe you’re just fucking crazy,” Zayn pointed to his head, finger poking at the hood. “Because I know Sabrina. And I know she wasn’t lying when she said she never told you about Louis and Saf. But how the fuck did you _know_? How do you _know_ , Harry? Who the _fuck_ are you? I fucking watched you, to see through it, to see if you really were a fucking psycho, and it’s just not there. Just fucking… Just say it. Tell me the truth!”

Harry tries to step forward again.

“Stop. You don’t get to say the shit you said to me, make me question my entire fucking life, and who I am, and who you are, and then answer nothing… and still get to touch me. Because you don’t.” Zayn’s entire body shakes with anger, even when Harry looks up at him with pleading eyes.

She shows up about then, not bouncing into the room, or zooming in like it’s a game. She’s just there, in the time it takes to blink, hovering near Zayn. Glowing in a low light, like one of the lamps in the windows with a handkerchief on top.

“Just say it,” Louis whispers from the corner, unseen and half a world away.

“What if he doesn’t believe me?” Harry can’t help but say out loud.

“He will. Because he wants to, deep down.”

“It’s a lot to ask of someone,” Harry wipes at his face.

Zayn’s entire face falls into a frown, confused and still angry, watching Harry with set eyes. Eyes as black as the night sky. Face contorted. As Harry speaks into thin air.

“Harry,” he hisses.

Harry didn’t have to lay it out like this with Niall. He didn’t have to be as selective with his words, not when Niall didn’t want every minute detail. But Zayn deserves it, he deserves the whole fucking world, so Harry takes a deep breath.

“It started when I was ten,” he says robotically, eyes glazing over. “I was doing my homework at my desk. I remember a bowl of carrots sitting in my lap. My mom said they were good for your eyes, and I liked my eyes.”

Zayn stares him down.

“I heard my closet door creak open, so I turned around to see if it was the cat. It wasn’t. It was a man. Jeans. An orange tshirt, same color as my carrots. And half of his face was missing. It was just half off. Blood and bone and muscle.”

Zayn recoils a bit, steps back to separate their bodies even further, until he his ass hits the bedside table. A glass of water rattles as he tries to take it in.

“He was the first ghost to show up,” Harry says as he pinches his lip. “He just stared at me. I couldn’t move. I ended up pissing my pants and running to my mom’s room.”

“So you…” Zayn’s voice shakes.

“I can see ghosts. I see them all the time. Everywhere.”

Zayn blinks.

“They don’t always know they’re dead. They walk around like everybody else sometimes, just going from place to place. Some know, though. Some know they're dead and gone, and they're angry about it. And some come find me, or are like, drawn to me somehow. They know I can see them. They want so badly to be seen, you know?”

“Jesus Christ,” Zayn runs a hand through his hair.

Harry waits for it. He’s patient. Safaa gets closer to Zayn, practically sitting on top of his shoulder now, so bright. Pulsing slightly, like she’s breathing for him.

“So,” Zayn starts, his chin shaking, his face jumping around like it did when Harry lied. “So you – Lou and Saf, then?”

Harry nods.

“They… they’re around, then? Sometimes?”

Harry nods.

“And you talk to them.”

Harry nods.

“How do I know you’re not full of shit?” Zayn says pleadingly, his eyes wide, like maybe saying it could somehow make it untrue. But he knows it’s true, Harry knows he knows it. He just needs the final push.

Louis knows, too.

“Tell him I’m holding my keys,” he whispers, his voice breaking through the thick air. He’s smiling. Harry can tell. "He'll know. He'll understand. I'm tossing my keys in my hand, say it."

“Maybe… maybe you’re just an asshole,” Zayn nods, thinking Harry has gone quiet, wiping a tear away. “Maybe you’re still lying.”

Safaa hates it, she really hates it, she tries to nuzzle into Zayn’s shoulder like a kitten. Saf doesn’t always know the full extent of her circumstance, but she's reminded then that Zayn can’t feel her, and she hates it.

Harry takes a step forward.

“Louis says to tell you…” Harry starts, as Zayn inhales so harshly, to keep himself from crying. “He says he’s holding his keys.”

“Fucking Christ,” Zayn almost whines in anguish, his face almost splitting in half. He tries to cover it with his hand, so Harry looks down at his feet. Louis said to ignore it, to let him be, to talk normal. Zayn just cries, from the admission itself, and the full knowledge and understanding that his best friend didn’t cease to exist the moment his heart stopped beating.

“He’s here,” Harry says to the floor with a small smile. “He’s with you all the time. And he’s barefoot. Really dirty feet.”

“Fuck off,” Louis scoffs from rooms away.

“He… yeah, he was barefoot a lot,” Zayn says in a few breaths, almost laughing, trying to regain composure.

Harry’s eyes don’t leave the floor.

“You make him happy,” Harry nods.

Zayn doesn’t say anything, he just sniffs a lot and tries to breathe through it. But Harry wants him to know all of it.

“You know that feeling you get, when the hair on the back of your neck stands up? And you feel so cold all of a sudden? Goosebumps and nervous energy? The kind that makes you look over your shoulder when you walk somewhere alone?”

Maybe Zayn nods his head then, but Harry still doesn’t look up.

“That’s them,” Harry continues in a whisper, still not looking up. “When they get angry.”

Zayn sniffs.

“But you know that other feeling you get sometimes, when you’re overwhelmed? Or scared? Or when you’ve had a really shitty friend scare you in his dorm room, and then lie to your face about it?”

Harry finally looks up to see Zayn staring at him, still crying.

“It’s that calmness that washes over you, settles you, ignites something in your gut that says you’ll be okay,” Harry whispers with a small smile. “That? That’s them, too. And for you… that’s Saf.”

Zayn lets out another low sound, like he’s trying to catch it before it escapes his mouth fully. He holds a thumb to his bottom lip and looks anywhere other than Harry. Like it hurts to even try.

“Louis was the one who told me to say sorry. He said you liked me, and that I needed to buy you a Big Mac.”

Zayn nods, his face red, but he doesn’t say anything.

“And Safaa was the one who made me hold your hands that first night in my dorm. Remember? I lost my breath and you grabbed for me? I took your hands. And that was it. That… Saf knew we needed it. She knew.”

Zayn blinks.

“I’m sorry I never told you. I just didn’t know how. I didn’t think anyone could know, I didn’t… I thought you’d be better off not knowing me period, let alone know my secret. I thought I needed to go it alone, you know? And I’m sorry for the things I said here,” Harry gestures to the empty space between them. “I used our shared childhood as a way to shove at you. I’m sorry I said you hold on too tight. I said the things I knew could hurt you. It was like, if you hated me, if I was the villain, then you’d never again have to ask if I was okay. You’d never have to worry about me.”

“I’m sorry I locked you in a closet,” Zayn sniffs sadly, looking at his boots.

“Zayn.”

“Or like – I’m sorry I didn’t stop Marcus. I was just… really fucked up then,” Zayn says, as he points to his head again.

“No, stop it.”

“I’m trying to apologize.”

“You don’t have to, that’s the point.”

“You’re so annoying,” Zayn can’t help but scoff, his lip curling slightly. Harry bites his lip to keep himself from smiling too hard, or worse, laughing. It’s too soon to make jokes.

Zayn wipes the back of his hand over his face, to stop the emotions from bubbling further. So Harry backs away, back towards the wall Zayn had been stuck against when Harry made up all the lies. It’s not easy, to have the information Zayn now has. It’s a lot to process, the fact that our souls never truly disappear. Some stay. Some bounce back and forth. Some are like Saf, souls so small and tiny, never fully grown, the ones who almost become guardian angels. Some are like Louis, aware and wise. Some are angry. Some don’t even know they’re not alive anymore. And now Zayn knows. Another human being knows the secret that twisted itself around Harry’s spine and rib cage when he was ten.

Harry pinches his lip harder between his fingers. Zayn may need time. Louis said he could have a hard go of it, could do what he did the last few weeks and dodge Harry’s every move. He could disappear again. He could become as aloof and distant as Harry was, when they spent weeks and weeks together tucked in his bed half naked, without ever offering anything of substance, emotionally or physically.

Harry needs to ready himself for the wait period. He needs to ready himself for the conversation that could very well happen eventually, where Zayn says it’s too much, too heavy, way too fucking soon.

He looks up to see Zayn staring right at him, no longer crying. Just blank. Face set.

“He wants you. He doesn’t want to be afraid,” Louis whispers in Harry’s ear, making him shiver.

“I know,” Harry whispers.

“Not of ghosts, you idiot. He doesn’t want to be afraid of _you_. Don’t let him be afraid anymore.”

And that’s really all there is to it, at the end of the day. Two young men standing in a room, terrified. Harry spends almost every second of every day terrified, worried over impending doom, the next surprise, the shadows out to get him. He’s terrified of who he is, the energy he attracts, the ways in which he’s capable of hurting someone. And maybe Zayn could see that all along.

Zayn stares at him.

“I think there’s something wrong with me,” Harry points to his stomach slightly, to the black tar slithering around. “I think I can be cruel. And that scares me. And I don’t know why my first instinct is to push. It’s like… that’s why I need you, you know? Because your first instinct is to hold on. And maybe that’s why it works.”

“Maybe so,” Zayn says with a slight shrug.

Harry hears Louis whisper something he can’t make out, like the whisper of a whisper. Suddenly Saf is gone, and the room doesn’t feel so full. The bass from downstairs thumps, Harry’s ears suddenly perked up again to the sounds of the party still happening in the house. They weren’t sucked into a vacuum after all.

Zayn takes a small step forward, which Harry sees as a good sign.

They meet in the middle of Zayn’s room, a killer and a hero, surrounded by dirty socks and opened books, on Harry’s favorite day of the year. With tentative hands, Harry reaches for him. He holds onto Zayn’s hips for dear life, his thumbs slipping underneath the leather vest and forest green fabric, to feel his searing skin. Zayn crowds close, his eyes bouncing across Harry’s face, searching for something.

Harry opens up: his legs, his eyes, his lips. He’d open up his fucking chest, if Zayn asked him to. He’d do it with a scalpel if he had one, if Zayn needed to see the black heart and evil Harry still knows writhes within him somewhere. If Zayn needed to see his heart racing and stomach roaring with butterflies, the demon crawling around trying to make room for Zayn, he’d rip himself open right then and there.

If it’s what Zayn really wants, if he’s going to bleed out in this bedroom, he’ll try his hardest to make sure Zayn doesn’t slip in it.

Zayn brings a hand to Harry’s face, and he must see it. The walls crumbling, the ghosts pressing in from outside somewhere, the secrets tucked in Harry’s mouth that he’s finally let go of.

He must also see, with a thumb on the scabbed cut on Harry’s cheek, that it’s not Halloween makeup. It’s not a gag or fake plastic for effect. It’s real, just like the bruises on Harry’s neck. Zayn frowns slightly, but sees all of it.

"They can hurt you?" he whispers

"Yeah."

Zayn's thumb sends a shiver down Harry's spine, the longer they stare.

Eventually Zayn presses their mouths together as people cheer down in the yard, as another song amps up. Harry holds so tight, gets so close, he feels Zayn, his slice of the sun, his furnace and tether, his best friend, the boy who stuck his finger in Harry’s ice cream to make him laugh. Harry’s feet sizzle, his fingers vibrate, his chest explodes in a warmth so strong, he could’ve sworn Saf was right in between them. But it’s just them, only them, hot and sweet.

Together, they taste like candy.

 

***

 

They don’t stay in Zayn’s room for much longer after the kiss. They head back to the party, to finish it up the right away. But after the lights come on hours later and people file out one by one, after they’ve had a few more drinks while Harry danced and Zayn watched, they crowd together in Zayn’s bed in their underwear. Niall had kissed Harry’s cheek goodbye, all dramatic-like, before he drunkenly whispered, “We ain’t afraid of no ghosts, are we, Haz?” He then winked and stumbled off to Sabrina’s room down the hall.

Zayn didn’t want to talk anymore, too tired and warm to push at it. There were still about a million questions to answer, namely, “Why did Louis stay? What else does he want to tell me? And what about Saf? Why me? Where do we go after this? Once souls leave here? Is then that really it? Do we just disappear and cease to exist?”

They both know it. Lots to discuss and all. But it was definitely too late to have _that_ kind of existential crisis, so they kiss again instead. At one point, Zayn looks at him and smiles, the makeup applied to look like a mask all smudged down onto the apples of his cheeks. Harry almost says apples are his favorite food, as he grips Zayn’s face in his hands, and runs his thumbs along them.

Eventually they settle in to really sleep. Harry’s so happy to have Zayn back in a bed, he curls right up into his side, his face almost in Zayn’s bare armpit. The house has gone back to normal, big and imposing as always, but quiet once more. Floorboards creak and the foundation settles every so often, the wind knocking it to and fro, so deathly quiet, Harry might feel afraid if Zayn wasn’t around.

It’s just Zayn and Harry in the room, thankfully. Maybe Louis and Safaa know to stay away for a bit longer, to let Harry have a few more hours without any of them near.

They fall asleep just like they did every night in Harry’s bed: content and close, Harry’s hands in the praying position under his chin, to soak up Zayn’s warmth.

Harry loves Halloween. It’s his favorite day.

They sleep it off until just after sunrise, only a few hours after they collapsed under thick blankets together. They stay cozy and lethargic, in post-fight stillness and after-party fatigue, until they’re not.

They’re not alone, when suddenly a man pulls Harry out of bed by his hair, rips some of it clean out of his scalp. Harry is forced up and out of the bed, his toes barely grazing the floor, as a man the size of a bear throws Harry around like a rag doll. In three seconds flat, he’s pinned to the wall by his throat. 

It takes Zayn a few hazy moments to realize Harry is gone, his hand reaching next to him in bed, feeling around for Harry’s cold hand. It takes a few seconds more for Zayn to realize that Harry is seemingly glued to his bedroom wall by some invisible force, as his lips turn blue.

He can't breathe, he can't fight back, there's nothing he can do. His brain goes fuzzy from the lack of oxygen. Zayn sits up and calls out his name, from somewhere far away.

Harry starts to die then, slowly, with Zayn’s horrified eyes on him, right as Safaa bounces into the room to play.

 

    


	4. Chapter 4

***

Somewhere in the indiscernible distance, Polish polka music drifts from an old record player. It floats along Brewer Street, trickling past like water into the mucked up drainage pipes no one’s bothered to clear out since last month’s storm, all the way up to the second level of the house, smacking Harry across the face. Harry listens to it just barely and rolls his eyes as he puts his hammer back in his uncle’s toolbox.

The bare bones of the new house sit on the side of town where all of the Polish and Irish Catholics settled, where they cohabitated and mixed together reluctantly in a new place. To this day, you can’t walk down a drunken street within the old North Bratton neighborhood, without hearing a few slurs hurled. It’s still a loop of dropped syllables, _fuckin’ micks_ and _no-good polaks_ , smashing beer bottles and the saddened faces of young men after the war who had nothing better to do than to blame each other for everything and nothing at all.

But it’s looking up, the way the house frame has started to come together, even though Harry and his family detest the Polish neighbors on either side of the yard. Harry ignores the awful music and crosses himself for patience. He tosses one of the unused sheets through the 2x4 studs closest to the tools, praying it lands near his trash pile by the truck, his boots thumping along the thin plywood that makes up the makeshift floor. So far they have the foundation laid, the fir studs placed just so to create the general layout of the house, and a set of stairs leading to the second floor. They still need to get the second story good and done. No roof yet, not even the ½ inch-thick plates of steel bolted between the planks to set them, no walls, no floor. Just the frame, the skeleton, the promise of a new home a few blocks over from their old one, and the thick scent of freshly cut wood in Harry’s hair and between his fingers.

Everyone has left for the day and it’s just Harry finishing up, right as the locusts start singing their sundown song. It’s pleasant tonight, in the open air of the house frame, surrounded by nothing but lush trees and swooping birds. But Harry should focus. He kicks at a few Coca-Cola bottles left behind by his lazy asshole cousins. They clink together like a wind chime, before rolling right off the ledge of the rickety wood he’s standing on. Another mess to clean up.

Harry grits his teeth and forgets them for now. If he can hurry and get the tools loaded up, he may just make it to first round at Rafferty’s, for a lager with the boys from the train yard. They owe him something big, they do. And if he’s really lucky, maybe he can scrounge a few cents together to call up Ina and see how her classes have been going.

Harry’s just about done as he wipes his weathered hands against his jeans, reaching for his comb to slick his hair back some, when he hears the footsteps. Big booming footsteps, stomping along the first level, practically cracking the plywood Harry spent so long laying down. Harry turns, to yell at one of his lazy asshole cousins most likely, to relax.

But then the footsteps go into a full run, up the stairs, a thick mane of flaming red hair being the first thing Harry sees. He tilts his head and almost laughs, because he knows what this is about.

Rian Glavin. One fifth of the Glavin brothers from two blocks over, second eldest, years older than Harry. Massive, thick jawed, half Glavin, a fourth Hurley, a fourth Gaffney. His mother Ruth gave Harry’s mother a pie when Harry’s brother Patrick came back from the war in one piece, bless her, even though her eyes were dead and cold as she offered it. The Glavins had that look to them: bright red, like they’d be made of fire, but more like ice. War does that. So do men like Sean Sr.

Rian’s father Sean Sr. once gave him a black eye for kissing one of the richest girls from a different church. Like Harry’s family, like his uncles and cousins and second cousins, the Glavins were a rough bunch. Uncouth and hard. Poor and starving.

Harry might feel sorry for him and his brothers, if he wasn’t too busy worrying about his own goddamn family.

As Rian stomps closer, Harry crosses himself for self-restraint.

“Did you think I wouldn’t find out?” Rian sneers, stepping right up to Harry. He spits when he talks, he always has, and Harry can’t help but smirk at him.

“Answer me, Clancy,” he says with a stab to Harry’s chest, a dirty fingernail almost slicing through the thin white shirt Harry threw on that morning, as Harry’s last name resounds around them like a curse word.

“Don’t know what you’re talking about,” Harry smiles, stepping back.

“Yes you fuckin’ well do.”

Harry shrugs with a dramatic sigh.

“My brother saw you!”

“Saw me what?”

“Leaving her house! Trousers undone!”

Harry dabs at his upper lip with his handkerchief to rid the sweat collecting there. The locusts somehow feel louder tonight, the polka music dipping and diving through the air obnoxiously, as Rian crowds closer. Harry can’t help himself as he glances around them, to the makeshift floor for a weapon. You don’t get shoved into walls your whole life, by polaks and brogue Irishmen with something to prove, and not know to seek out a weapon.

It feels like time has slowed down some, as Harry contemplates how this could end up, and he mentally crosses himself for strength.

The toolbox practically screams at him, to hold something, to protect himself. But then a part of Harry’s brain screams at him even louder, that Rian wouldn’t have the guts to do it; he’d be too dumb to pick a fight like this. His father would whip his hide if he knew Rian came into someone’s (albeit unfinished) house to scuffle.

But Harry can’t help himself, he never can. A smart ass, is what he is. A fuckin’ mick. He’s the boy all the other boys wish they could be, the kind who does what he pleases, wars be damned. He’s the boy who got shoved around as a kid, until he learned to shove back. The boy who goes to church every Sunday in his nicest jacket and cap, sits next to his mother, crosses himself for his sins, all the while scraping flecks of blood from his knuckles and tasting the juices of a girl still on his tongue.

So maybe that’s why he says it.

“She sure was sweet,” Harry says with a gleeful smile and a wink.

Rian shakes with rage, his hands suddenly in fists.

And really, she was. Harry has known Rian’s girlfriend Aileen since they were in diapers, just as he’s known all the girls of all the families in the old neighborhood. And you can’t blame Harry, not when Aileen batted her eyelashes at him and twirled her wide skirt just so, to give him a peek of her girdle and thighs. So Harry asked his mother if she needed to give anything to the Carrolls, any recipes or extra cloth, maybe to return a casserole pan or two. And then as quick as anything, like with so many girls before, Harry had Aileen Carroll on her back up in the attic above her sister’s bedroom.

She wouldn’t take her brassiere off though, said she couldn’t show him any more skin than she already had, which was a shame. He would’ve liked to taste her there, too. She said a few times that she shouldn’t do it, that Harry should leave, but she came around in the end like they always do, and let him lick at her until she was shaking.

Rian couldn’t read Harry’s mind, of course. But he must’ve seen the thoughts drift across Harry’s face one after the other: taking her skirt off, spitting into his palm, touching her just so, her dark curls bouncing as she eventually sank into Harry’s lap with a sigh.

“You’ll fuckin’ pay for it, Shannon Clancy,” Rian practically grunts, his face bright red to match his hair. “I’ll fuckin’ kill you.”

Harry rolls his eyes, his head tilted back.

And that’s why Harry didn’t see it coming, the first hits. A swift one-two from Rian, a young man as big as a grizzly bear, to Harry’s stomach and jaw. Harry stumbles. Or well, Shannon stumbles, _my name is Shannon_ , and he falls hard. Pain erupts in both kneecaps as he sways there on the thin, cracking floor, as stars drift in and out of focus in front of his face.

As the adrenaline surges, Harry throws an arm out to his right, his fingers searching for something. Toolbox. He realizes he has a wrench, a cast iron pipe wrench that cost his uncle a small fortune. Harry can’t see straight, his head fills up with smoke, bright lights all around him. He sees flashes of Rian’s angry face, the more he kicks and punches Harry all over. He feels himself get pulled to his feet, pinned to one of the thick beams that will eventually support the roof, his head suddenly not so full after all. No oxygen. Fingers around his neck, his lips turning blue, and he feels himself slipping under.

All he can see is Rian’s angry face, an inch from his own, broken and angry. He had the guts to do it after all.

But then Harry is in Zayn’s room and he can hear Zayn’s voice calling out his name somewhere behind Rian, his billowing shirt and brown trousers blocking Harry’s view. Zayn’s there, but Harry can only hear his voice distantly. It’s a string of _Harrys_ over and over again, _but no, my name is Shannon_ , and Rian won’t let go.

No. They’re back in Harry’s new house, _Shannon’s_ new house, Harry being choked within an inch of his life, when he musters the strength to swing the pipe wrench. It’s heavy enough to do damage, as it cracks Rian’s skull. Harry falls from his clutches as Rian sways on the spot, suddenly at a loss for how it could’ve happened, hand still limply around Harry’s bruised throat. It’s like he has a moment of realization, that he’s about to die, his eyes befalling the wrench in Harry’s shaking hand, like maybe he sees the clump of his own hair and blood stuck to it.

But then they’re in Zayn’s room and Rian doesn’t know how to handle his impending death, his fearful eyes finding Harry’s, as they stare.

No, they’re on the second floor of Harry’s new house, the locusts singing, the oaks and elms so green around them, as Rian starts to fall forward. Into Harry. Harry, still so deprived of oxygen, so unsteady on his feet, makes a sad attempt to stop the body coming at him. He can’t, though. It’s no use. Rian falls against his chest, his hand scraping at Harry’s throat as he dies first, and then they’re falling through the wall-less house to the ground below.

Their skulls make the same sound, at the same time, as they hit the rock driveway.

All Harry can hear is polka. That’s all Harry can comprehend as he drifts away, up and over his crumpled, broken body. That awful music, that dirty, repulsive music his grandfather once threw his own punches over.

He’s hovering over his body. He takes in the way his blonde hair, always stick straight and combed just so, his left-side part so perfect from all the Brylcreem, splays in a mess all over his forehead. Blood oozes from beneath his skull and chest, and if his mother could see how he ruined another shirt, she’d slap him silly. Dead. The Polka doesn’t sound so loud anymore. He almost sort of misses it, as it all goes quiet. He drifts for a bit, until he’s back in Zayn’s room. He’s back in Zayn's house, Zayn’s room, the house, against Zayn’s wall with blue lips, Zayn’s house, _my name is Harry Styles, I can see ghosts_ , Zayn’s room, with Zayn’s eyes on him.

_No, my name is Shannon. Shannon O’Byrne Clancy._

Harry blinks his eyes as he sinks into the wall further, no longer fighting back, as Zayn calls to him again.

It’s a loop. A true loop.

Looping.

Like an old tape deck. Hit the stop button. Rewind. Press play.

On a loop.

And once Harry realizes he’s in the loop, he knows it’s about to start all over, however many times Rian needs. Harry looks down and sees that he’s once again standing on the second floor of an old two-story in the 1950s, putting Shannon Clancy’s tools away. His cousins have just left. The Coca-Cola bottles back where they started. Harry tries to shake his head and breathe through it, to get out, but it’s no use. Rian’s feet stomp up the stairs once more.

It happens four more times. Harry dies an awful and violent death four more times, before finally, thankfully, Rian Glavin lets his throat go and drifts back to wherever he came from.

The room becomes lighter, Harry comes back to himself, no longer Shannon, just Harry Harry Harry. Zayn holds his face between his palms as he tries to stand there against the wall, so close and yet so far away, his voice a whisper, a shadow, in another language Harry can’t decipher.

Finally, his arms and legs go limp, as the low light filtering in the room grows smaller and smaller, until it’s nothing but a pin prick.

Harry slumps to the floor of Zayn’s room and passes out.

 

***

 

She warms his hands first. Safaa pays special attention to Harry’s hands, where he’s curled in a ball there on the floor. Harry can feel Zayn’s own hands against his cheeks, slapping at him a bit, can smell him like the ripe pear he is, as he tries to get Harry to wake up. Thank god the Maliks can divide and conquer when it counts, because Harry at least is aware of the fact that he’s himself again, with warm hands on his cheeks and his fingers not so numb. The Malik siblings bring him back together. Harry feels himself shift slightly, as Safaa tries to warm him up all over next. He blinks a few times.

In his haze, Harry takes in the floorboard across from them, the wood slightly warped and worn, near the foot of Zayn’s bed. It has an inscription, a name maybe, or perhaps a date carved with an old hunting knife. Something left behind by some other boy in this might-as-well-be frat house, years before Zayn even existed. Humans are so funny, the way they feel the need to leave traces behind. Like they don’t want to be forgotten when they’re dead and gone.

“You’re not forgotten,” Harry grumbles lowly, speaking to Rian just as much as he speaks to ghosts as a whole.

“Harry,” Zayn whispers, his voice wet, turning Harry’s head completely. Harry ends up on his back, shaking slightly there on the freezing cold floor, even as Safaa continues her mission to get the oxygen circulating again.

“Hi,” Harry whispers, blinking slowly.

“Babe, you… I saw…”

Harry reaches a hand for Zayn’s face right above his own, his eyes wide, a complete wreck. Harry’s obviously never seen what a loop looks like from an outsider’s perspective, but he imagines it’s not exactly pretty. He has the scars to prove it.

“I’m okay,” he says, the waver in his voice saying otherwise.

“No you’re not.”

“I’ll be okay.”

“It choked you. It had you by the throat, and it choked you, and you couldn’t breathe. Your lips went blue and I couldn’t move from the bed, I was like…”

Zayn babbles a bit, hysterically, and Harry has to shush him. Zayn must see _Harry_ trying to comfort _him_ , when he’s not the one half-dead on the floor, so he quickly shakes his head.

“We’re okay,” Zayn says with assuredness, like when he first brought Harry back all those weeks ago in his dorm. “We’ll be just fine.”

Harry doesn’t quite believe him, and yet would trust Zayn with his entire life. Harry supposes that will always be the duality to the two of them: never fine, but fine enough.

So in the end, they will be perfect, once Harry does his routine check: he lets Zayn’s cheek go so he can feel around his face, for any new cuts, a nose bleed, something. Any time he loops, he checks. If his mom finds him cut up or broken, if he has to walk home with a fucked up ankle, he likes to be the one to make the discovery. He reaches for the back of his head to feel for any gaping wounds, if the loop of it slamming into the ground caused any damage.

“You’re okay,” Zayn says with another sure nod. “I checked everywhere.”

The look in Zayn’s eyes say _of course I checked everywhere, I can check again if you want, I’m right here._

Harry hopes his eyes send a message of their own.

_You really are the sun._

Zayn tries to smile. Maybe he gets it.

“I’m sorry,” Harry says with tremble to his lip. “I didn’t want you to see – ”

“Don’t apologize.”

Harry blinks.

“Don’t tell me what to do.”

They can’t help but smile at their bickering, there on Zayn’s dusty floor, in their underwear as the sun rises further in the sky. Safaa backs off a bit, not as close to Harry’s feet any longer.

“Besides,” Harry tries to shrug, “I had Saf to warm me up.”

Zayn’s lip trembles, as he nods.

“I told you: she’s like a guardian angel. For your whole family,” Harry says. “And for me, sometimes.”

Zayn must like the sound of that, because his cheeks pink up a bit.

He ends up grabbing Harry’s forearms and pulling him upright, where he sways on the spot. He’s back in Zayn’s bed in no time at all, still shaking a bit, from the cold and the adrenaline and the surge of emotion his body has been put through. He won’t be able to sleep necessarily, but it’s good to rest his head as the blood rushes back to it.

Harry tries to settle himself, to get his heart rate down, as Zayn lies on his chest. Coming back from a loop is never easy. Even when he’s not still living those last few minutes of a person’s life, he can’t help but replay them. He’s no longer Shannon, but he can still feel the traces of him. The way Shannon looked up at the sky, his eyes blank, his hair a mess. And Shannon loved his hair, he really did. It was so unlike Harry’s. But Shannon was so unlike Harry as well. He was disrespectful, dirty, disgusting towards women. A coward. Smarmy. A thief. Harry had a glimpse into Shannon’s thoughts, and they were loaded with the pain he so easily inflicted.

Harry never thought he had good luck; in fact, he probably has the worst luck of anyone he’s ever met. But he considers himself especially unlucky when he gets into the loop and is cast as a bad person. He’s stabbed people, strangled them, watched as they slit their wrists because of him. He’s laughed, cried, sat still as a stone as a person wasted away, over and over. This one feels just as rough, just as tangible, when he was in the headspace of that long-ago man. Rian certainly knew it, that Shannon Clancy wasn’t necessarily evil, but he was hardly ever _good_.

Harry feels a shiver cross over his skin. It’s not a ghost nearby, but just another reminder of what Harry had just been through. Again. But then Zayn shifts and Harry’s eyes fly open. Zayn. Leaning on his side over Harry, eyes intent. Harry forgets he’s not in this alone anymore.

“Why do they hurt you?” Zayn asks with a rough voice, angry.

Harry’s not sure how to answer that.

“I don’t think they know for sure. And neither do I. It’s just… it just happens. They pull me in and take me somewhere else, maybe so I can share in it?”

Zayn frowns further.

“And then you wake up?”

“Yeah.”

“All by yourself? Does your mom know?”

Harry shakes his head.

“Niall?”

Harry bites his lip and nods a bit.

“He knows that I can see them. But he’s never seen… this side of it.”

“What about your friends?”

“I don’t have any friends.”

Zayn looks murderous. Harry can feel the hand on his hip turn into a fist, as Zayn pulls himself closer.

“Yes you do. You do now,” he says with a nod. Zayn leans down to kiss Harry, like it’s the most important thing he’ll ever do. It’s a little rough, like he’s trying to calm himself down just as much as Harry. Then he kisses Harry’s cheek. His chin, his jaw, his forehead, his other cheek, each eyelid. Harry lets him, he sinks into the bed as every muscle relaxes, as Zayn’s lips touch his skin over and over.

When Zayn stops, when he doesn’t lie back down or move, Harry opens his eyes. He can feel himself drifting back to sleep, which is unbelievable. He’s gone days without sleep after bad loops. After the crawl space, they called an ambulance. As he’s gotten older, as it’s gotten worse, he usually can’t sit still. Once during his sophomore year, he ran for an entire weekend until he passed out in his own driveway. But with Zayn so close, with someone to share it with, it’s like Harry’s body just knows. _It’s okay now. Sleep._

Zayn presses his thumb to Harry’s bottom lip and stares at him. And right as Harry blinks a few more times, as he drifts off, he remembers.

Harry can’t help but smile into Zayn’s thumb.

“I thought you said we weren’t friends,” Harry whispers.

Zayn doesn’t respond, he just moves his thumb up to Harry’s eyebrow, to smooth it, to feel the normal anxious lines of his forehead long gone. Zayn leans back in to kiss him again. Slower, sweeter, just a press of their lips as soft as a breeze.

Harry falls asleep with Zayn’s mouth on his throat, right above the eventual bruises and seared skin, like he’s trying to settle Harry everywhere all at once.

 

***

 

Hours later, Harry wakes up again. He’s alone, not even Saf around anymore, the room steeped in that sepia tone Philadelphia adopts every fall whenever the sun makes its way west. Harry rubs his eyes and stretches, as he looks towards the window. It’s officially November. The Christmas decorations have probably already been rolled into department stores, Thanksgiving turkeys shipped out, fall leaves no longer crunchy and beautiful, but purposefully blown away with leaf blowers before the first snowfall.

He should feel guilty about missing the party clean up he promised Niall, but he can’t seem to care much, not when it’s the day after Halloween. Harry’s least favorite day of the year, just for existing post-black-and-orange. He’ll apologize later and present his bruises, if Niall seems pissed enough.

Someone clears their throat, jolting Harry’s eyes away from the window.

Louis steps out of the closet, his feet so filthy, Harry wants to scold him for stepping all over Zayn’s rug.

But then Harry can’t help but frown as he sits up, wondering where Zayn even is. When he’s coming back. Why he left.

Louis snorts and rolls his eyes. _Why he left? Really?_

“Food,” Louis answers himself.

“Oh yeah," Harry shrugs, trying to play it cool, like he wasn't at all worried. "I figured.”

“Liar.”

Harry ignores him and looks towards the window again. It’s not that he expected Zayn to up and leave him after his big reveal the night before, _and_ his incident that morning. But it’s a lot. It’s even more than Niall knows. It’s just so fucking much to ask of someone, to stick around or make you feel better after nearly being choked to death by some invisible ghost with no real ties to either of you. Harry will forever be the guy to alter Zayn’s world, as he once knew it. _Sometimes we don’t leave. Sometimes we stay. Ghosts are real. They can touch you. They can pin you to walls and freeze your loved ones. They can hurt you._ Zayn watched Harry die, slowly and painfully. So really, Harry should probably prepare himself for some version of, “I really like you, Harry. But I’m a fucking freshman, and I really should focus on school and friends, and you know, _not_ worry about dead people coming into my room. Good luck with everything.”

Harry rubs his eyes again, wishing he could fall back asleep until Zayn gets home.

“Can you give him some fucking credit, please?” Louis scoffs, pulling him out of it.

“Can you stop reading my fucking thoughts?”

“They’re so goddamn loud, can you blame me?” Louis puts his hands on his hips angrily.

“I swear if I could hit you, I would.”

Louis practically skips over to Zayn’s desk, before throwing himself ungracefully on top of it to sit with his legs crossed.

“And if I were still alive, I _wish_ you would. I would _love_ to see you try.”

Harry almost throws a retort his way, about how he has muscle tone and stamina, and a twerp like Louis wouldn’t stand a chance against this version of him. But then the door creaks, almost laughable in its loudness. Louis and Harry both turn to see Zayn standing in the doorway, his face blank.

Wordlessly, he holds up a greasy McDonald’s bag.

“I thought we could have Big Macs,” Zayn says with a small smile.

Harry smiles at him and gestures to the bed. Louis shuts his mouth so quickly, Harry practically hears his teeth snap together. Zayn kicks off his shoes climbs onto the bed to sit with his back against the wall, so Harry turns to match him. Zayn begins to rifle through the bag, as Harry tries to peek inside. He’s never had this kind of fast food before.

“Smells good,” Harry says on an exhale, suddenly ravenous.

But Zayn stills his movements entirely.

Here it comes, then. Harry almost moves away so their thighs aren’t touching, to brace for impact.

“Is he here?” Zayn says quietly, looking up and around his bedroom.

Louis scratches at the few hairs on his chin and waits.

Harry glances from Louis back to Zayn, unsure. Louis nods like it’s inevitable, to get through the line of questioning Harry suspects they’ve both figured would have to happen.

“Yeah,” Harry turns back to Zayn, grabbing for his hand. “Yeah, he’s here.”

Zayn bites his lip and grips Harry’s cold fingers.

“Can I – Like, can I say hi? Or is that stupid?”

“That’s not stupid.”

Zayn exhales slowly.

“But like, he can hear me. He understands.”

“Yeah babe,” Harry nods. “He’s aware. Lucid. He’s here, he’s not going anywhere. Talk to him.”

For some reason, that makes Zayn frown. Harry has realized he loves every version of Zayn’s face, and his frown is no different. But it also means Zayn is either sad or thinking too hard, so Harry reaches up to poke at the crease between his eyebrows.

Harry smiles and gestures to Lou. Zayn blinks a few times and exhales again, just as slowly.

“Hey Lou,” Zayn says, like he’s trying it out.

Louis smiles at him, and suddenly Harry feels like he should go. Like he should leave them alone in the private moment. But that wouldn’t exactly work, if he wasn’t there to translate.

Harry then gestures at Zayn, to get Louis to say something back.

“Oh yeah,” Louis rubs at his thighs excitedly. “I forget I can talk back now. He talks to me sometimes, but I obviously can never say anything. So I just sit there like a knob.”

Harry snorts a laugh.

“What? What did he say?” Zayn says in a rush.

“Tell him I say hi,” Louis nods.

“He says hi,” Harry supplies. “He also said… that you sometimes talk to him, but he can never respond. So he feels like a knob.”

Louis squawks in anger, makes a noise that has Harry laughing again. _Don’t tell him shit unless I ask you to, Harry. Don’t be a dick._

Harry snorts again, reaching for the food to get it out for the both of them.

_Don’t be a baby, Lou. It’s not a good look._

Zayn watches him, before glancing towards his desk. It’s where Harry directs his eyes and his voice, so Zayn follows the movement. Maybe he pictures Louis there, maybe he can practically see him, just like Harry can. So familiar, so perfect, not a scratch on him.

Louis pretends like he’s going to turn all the way around to face the window, to ignore Harry completely, before losing his nerve. He ends up laughing.

“He’s funny,” Harry smiles.

“Yeah? You think so?” Zayn smiles back.

“Yeah.”

“Not _that_ funny,” Zayn says with a wrinkle to his nose, as he rolls his eyes over towards his desk. “Louis always did think he was funnier than anyone else did.”

Louis makes that noise again and shifts his keys in his pocket. Suddenly his eyes get mischievous, the blue of them gleaming in the low lamp light near Zayn’s bed. Harry pops a fry in his mouth and almost dies of a heart attack it’s so good.

“You tell him,” Louis points at Harry, “that if he keeps this up, I’ll tell you about that night in my hospital room, with Margaret and Dillon.”

It’s not exactly fair to pit them against each other, but the situation is honestly so ridiculous and Harry is curious, so he turns to Zayn. Choosing to ignore the “hospital” bit of that sentence for now, he slaps on a face of mock anger and confusion, and even clutches his chest like he’s wearing pearls. Zayn eyes him nervously as he chews a fry of his own.

“And who are Margaret and Dillon?”

Zayn almost chokes he coughs so hard.

“Absolutely not. No. Hell no.”

Harry and Louis both laugh, practically rolling over onto their sides as Zayn waves his hands.

“Nope. Louis, you are dismissed. Get lost. Go away.”

“Some best friend you are!” Louis scoffs with a laugh, wiping his eyes.

“You heard him,” Harry shrugs.

“Kicking me out? Really?”

“Goodbye, Louis,” Zayn practically shouts, off in the vague direction he assumes Louis to be in.

“Fine. But you’ll miss me, I’m sure.”

Louis hops off Zayn’s desk and makes his way towards the door, as if he needs one, before turning with a final flourish.“And Harry, remember what I said. You should blow him,” he gestures towards Zayn.

Harry’s cheeks flare red as he giggles like a little girl, grabbing for the bag of food to keep his hands busy.

“Don’t worry, he’s gone,” he says nervously.

Zayn kisses his cheek.

It’s not until Louis is long gone and they’re officially eating the behemoths that are Big Macs, when Zayn nudges Harry’s knee. He has that weird unnaturally colored sauce on his lip and Harry wants to lick it off.

“He said something filthy, didn’t he,” Zayn winks at him, wiping the sauce away with his thumb. He sucks it into his mouth and licks at it, and Harry very nearly has a stroke.

Harry crosses himself for virtue.

 

***

 

To Louis’s credit, he knows Zayn so well, Harry needn’t have worried. Harry should’ve given Zayn the credit he deserved all along, to not freak out or leave Harry alone. He certainly never did before, even when Harry fucked it all up and pushed. And maybe Harry knows Zayn pretty well now too, since he knew from the beginning that Zayn holds tight.

That night after they eat their food, they clean up the last remnants of the party. They slave their way through the kitchen and downstairs bathrooms, since none of Zayn’s other roommates dared to touch either. But they deserved it, after skirting helping just because Harry died a few times against Zayn’s wall. At Harry’s careful insistence, Zayn tells him about Safaa as they work their way through Lysol and literal bags of paper towels, across every surface and cracked tile. She died when she was three, when she choked on a piece of plastic while at daycare. Zayn doesn’t remember much of the day itself, but he remembers his father rushing towards him at school, before grabbing his face between his massive palms and crying all over him.

Harry feels like collapsing at the end of it, well after midnight, when he sees Zayn yawn. After the last day they’ve had, it would probably be polite for Harry to leave him to it, alone with his thoughts, to digest it all.

So Harry grabs his costume and shoes near the front door. He stares at Zayn, unsure of what to say. A measly thank you doesn’t seem to be enough. But on the opposite end of the spectrum, saying something like, “I think you’re the one to change it all” doesn’t seem to be right either.

Zayn rolls his eyes and tells Harry to wait. He takes the stairs two at a time, before sliding down the banister exactly thirty seconds later with his massive bag on his back and a snapback covering his head.

When they walk back to Harry’s dorm in the crisp night air, even as the shadows shift a bit and Harry feels a few pairs of eyes on him, they hold hands. Harry can’t believe he ever had the restraint to not hold onto Zayn somehow, out in public or otherwise. He doesn’t want to let go.

Zayn feels so warm and steady, Harry can’t focus on much else.

 

***

 

Classes start up on Monday. The world continues to turn, the leaves keep falling, every morning comes with a fresh coat of frost, dead eyes follow Harry wherever he goes. His mom texts him like she always does, he drinks his coffee with extra espresso on his early days, has lunch with Niall, lets Zayn into the dorm night after night. Tests, papers, study groups. The sky is blue. The wind blows. Hershey’s kisses taste just as sweet.

From an outsider’s pragmatic perspective, not much has changed.

And yet, for Harry Styles, everything’s changed.

When Niall finally found out his secret, Harry felt relief. It was like even when he didn’t completely divulge the gory details, at least someone knew. Harry had the explicit knowledge that without fail, another human being could at least attest to his episodes. Someone knew he wasn’t making it up, and that he wasn’t crazy. Niall could, at least empirically, understand Harry’s mood, his life, his disposition.

But it’s different once Zayn knows. Unlike Niall, Zayn wants all the details, every single one. When Harry hesitates to share, if he sees something in the distance that makes his heart race, feels a blood-curdling scream in his bones, Zayn knows. He feels the tick under his palm, the sweat of Harry’s brow, the stumble in his step. He quite literally pulls Harry out of it, against his body, wherever they may be, and asks that same question he asked weeks before.

_What do you see?_

Harry tells him, when he can.

“Sometimes I don’t always understand it myself,” Harry tried to explain one morning as they walked to class. “I don’t always _see_. I get feelings, of someone close by, of their name or where they come from. It just… I can feel them, but I don’t know where they are, or what they want.”

“So if I see you go someplace else, behind the eyes, and you can’t talk about it, I can just… wait it out? It doesn’t always mean you’re about to loop?”

Harry nodded and kissed him against a tree. Zayn had started to understand what a loop meant, a true loop, when Harry gets pulled out of his head entirely. Zayn freely admitted he hated it, couldn’t imagine having to watch it happen again, but he swore he wouldn’t let Harry wake up alone again. Not if he could help it. Harry knew he was telling the truth, and felt it in his gut, the fierceness and protective nature he’s seen from within Zayn since they met again in college. As they fused together near that tree, Harry felt his hands tingling, as he remembered all the times Zayn kept him held together since they met again in college. It’s a rush.

A few nights after that conversation, Harry feels the first inklings of another loop, as they curl up in his bed. Niall had winked at them as he left, said he had a “study date” of his own, “in Sab’s bed, thank you very much, so make sure to keep each other warm for the night and wear a condom.” Zayn threw a Twizzler at his back, as they joked back and forth. Harry didn’t add to it, even though his cheeks reddened at the comment. They haven’t done anything more than kiss, even though they’re both clearly anticipating the moment they finally get naked.

But Harry had to zone out for a beat; he couldn’t put his finger on why his mood suddenly shifted, until it was staring him in the face.

It’s not like in Zayn’s room when he was in the dead of sleep, completely at the mercy of that ghost. Those loops can sometimes be a blessing and a curse, without the added dread of one about to hit. After all, sometimes a pop quiz is preferable: there’s really no time to stress out over it. If he’s asleep and pulled into one, so be it. If he feels the tingle in his feet, like a perceptive bird before a thunderstorm, it means he has to properly worry.

Harry props his head on his hand and pulls the blanket tighter around them, tries to tuck it behind his back so he can’t touch the freezing cold wall. Zayn shuffles closer, on his stomach, lips to Harry’s chest. He had a long day. That morning, he gave a speech to his childhood psychology class about learned behavior, which Harry knows for a fact he aced. But public speaking can be taxing, so Harry grips at Zayn’s hip under the twenty pounds of blanket and wool covering them.

“You good?” Zayn asks, his eyes all big and beautiful staring up at Harry.

“I don’t know,” Harry frowns.

“What do you see?”

Harry tries to feel it out, whatever energy has seeped into the room beneath his dorm door like smoke. He gets lost in it, almost like he has a physical force field around him, like if he expands his brain enough, if he focuses on the door, down the hall, to the stairs, up to the roof, down to the lobby, he’ll find it.

Zayn shakes him a bit.

“You don’t have to figure it out by yourself anymore, babe. Remember?”

Harry looks down at his face, half squished into the mattress, and half into his own chest, and it’s like a flame erupts in his stomach. The swirling black mass of evil doesn’t feel so present anymore. He leans in to tilt Zayn’s face up, to turn him on his back, so he can kiss him. He can’t focus on the kiss for too long, still too engulfed in impending doom, when he feels Zayn’s index fingertip above his right nipple.

“What’s this one from?” Zayn wonders, the scar tissue raised and angry, an almost perfect circle.

The distraction works, because Harry can’t help but look down at where Zayn touches him. They’ve done this a few times, fingers over Harry’s various scars, and Zayn always frowns. But he really does want to know everything, every secret.

“I think that one was from some phantom cigar. I was a… bad boy, I guess,” Harry shrugs. That man, Albert, was awful. The kind of dad to punish his kids in places no one would see. Harry was twelve for that one. He hid in his closet, but it didn’t matter to Albert. Harry wasn’t his real kid, but he didn’t care.

“This one?” Zayn’s finger presses at the long scar towards Harry’s belly button, entire face in a grimace.

“A fingernail.”

Zayn runs his thumb over another scar on Harry’s bicep.

“Didn’t run fast enough then either.”

Zayn gives up his wandering fingers and pulls Harry’s face to his own. He slots their legs together just so as he deepens the kiss, and Harry feels them both hardening. It’s overwhelming, a forest fire, like his skin sizzles. Boiling water hitting a block of ice. Global warming, or some shit. Zayn bites Harry’s lip and Harry can’t wait anymore. He reaches for the waistband of Zayn’s briefs, and tugs them down to slip his hand inside.

But of course, they’re interrupted once she shows up, to stare at Harry.

Harry senses her, pulls away even when Zayn groans.

A teenage girl with beaded dreadlocks stands near Niall’s desk across the room, one hand missing and a gash in her chest.

Harry feels the energy surging through the room, a powerful one for such a small girl. She probably doesn’t even realize she’s doing it. Instead of pleasure or adrenaline, it’s like all Harry can feel is panic. It’s about to happen, he knows it. She’s about to grip his ankle and pull. He’ll fall to the floor, tumble into whatever world she needs him in. She’s from somewhere else, her thoughts in another language, Harry can’t see left from right, vision blurs.

“No,” Zayn shouts from under Harry’s body, their mouths still close. “No, Harry.”

Harry, in a daze, actually has the wherewithal to tilt his chin down to look at Zayn.

“Fight back. Say no. Say it, Harry.”

“No,” Harry says in barely a whisper.

“Tell them. Whoever’s here. Tell them. Say it.”

Harry blinks.

“No,” he says stronger, turning to her. “No, thank you.”

Even in the midst of the tense situation, Zayn can’t help but snort.

She doesn’t understand though. She’s like Rian, and the men from the crawl space. Unaware. Unaffected. A shadow. It’s not really her choice. She’s about to loop, she got drawn to Harry, and he’s about to fall into it. That’s just how it works.

Harry shakes his head. It didn’t work. She takes a step closer.

“No,” Zayn says again, pressing a hand to Harry’s chest. “Don’t let them do it. Tell them.”

“No,” Harry parrots. “Leave.”

He points to the door. He stares her down. It’s like he uses the reach inside his brain, to push back at her. Whatever part of her that can lock into Harry’s head, the bullet she can blast straight into his temple to send him into a spiral, he shoves it away. It’s like dueling energies in the room, fighting for dominance, a shadow and an eclipse. Because Harry’s not quite the sun, Zayn is. But Zayn’s there and he’s warm, and if he can harness that, he can harness anything. They’re an eclipse.

Zayn presses his hand against Harry’s chest harder, firmer. His warmth seeps into every pore, every cell, and Harry feels it from tip to toe. It sizzles.

Suddenly she’s gone. Harry can’t help the inhale, a rush of oxygen to his extremities. He heaves a few times, like he’s just done a mile out on the trails. He gulps for air, as Zayn pulls him closer. He touches their foreheads, whispers for Harry to breathe, to catch his breath.

“See? See, babe? We just… we just gotta be firm. I think that’s the key.”

“But – ”

“It’s like with Lou, right? You just… you just gotta say no. Tell them to leave. Don’t run and hope for the best, but really say it. _Mean_ it. And if they come back, if they really won’t leave, then we ask why. No loops. But real conversations. _You_ decide.”

Harry flashes to the woman in his dorm, the one who said he was polite. She left because Harry asked her to. The group in his room, when Niall found out. He thought it was because Niall was there, because Niall spoke up when Harry came in and interrupted the ghosts’ intentions. But didn’t Harry say over and over to leave him alone? For them all to shut up? Would Alan have left him alone if he listened to the story about his dad? Would the needle marks in his arm have slowly faded away if Harry had helped him? If he listened to this story, would the stranger have not just gone away, but also find peace?

Harry blinks at Zayn, at a loss. He swears he’s asked ghosts to go away before, and maybe they did. But he assumed they’d still show up to follow him eventually. Did they really always go away for good?

“When the hell did you get so smart?” Harry says with a smile, heart rate back to normal, body relaxed once more. “You a ghost expert now?”

“No, I’m just a very rational person,” Zayn slaps Harry’s cheek playfully. “And I figured it can’t hurt. To just ask.”

“Alright. That’s the plan, then. That’s what I’ll do, from now on.”

“Good. Fuck loops.”

“Fuck loops is right,” Harry scoffs, blowing hair from off his forehead.

Zayn eyes him slightly, his face still flushed from before, hair a mess. He even bites his lip, like he knows how good he looks. Sex on a stick, that Zayn Malik. And goddamn, does he know it.

Harry shakes his head, almost in disbelief that he gets Zayn like this.

“So…” Zayn smiles

“Zayn,” Harry kisses him once, sweetly. “I would very much like to blow you now. If that’s alright.”

“Fucking _finally_ ,” Zayn yells, a hand punching into the air, the other pulling Harry’s mouth to his.

That’s how they work now. In between horrible incidents and scary corpses, tucked around creepy corners and behind walls of bodies, they can still laugh. Zayn shushed a ghost out of Harry’s dorm room and then thirty seconds later, his eyes are sparkling with glee.

Harry kisses Zayn within an inch of his life, until he’s breathless and squirming, his body on fire and hot to the touch. Harry almost wants to curl up over him, just to tuck his ice cold toes under Zayn’s thighs, but he’d rather not be murdered because he’s caused the world’s worst blue balls.

So he finally, after weeks and weeks of build up and sexual tension, slides down Zayn’s body. He settles between Zayn’s thighs and tucks his fingers into his briefs, to pull them down just under his balls because he’s impatient. And then as Zayn watches, Harry sucks his dick with as much gusto and affection as possible, his eyes full of wonder and beauty. And that’s no easy feat, not with a pair of balls in your mouth.

Zayn curses like a sailor, holds Harry’s hair so tightly, Harry’s eyes water. He comes across Harry’s face at the last second, completely lost in the sensation. Harry, remembering Zayn and the Big Mac, sits up on his haunches and wipes at his mouth with his thumb, before sucking on it.

Zayn literally growls at him like a feral cat, before pulling at his neck to kiss him once more.

 

***

 

A few days later, Harry wakes up with a smile on his face. Two orgasms will do that to a person, he supposes. He stretches a bit, cracks his neck and ankles, entire body engulfed in the warmth of Zayn under all those blankets. His mouth has gone sour and he desperately needs to piss.

“Cozy,” Louis says in a low voice from Niall’s bed.

Harry props his head up to see over Zayn, and there is he, lying in a similar position, swinging his keys around on his finger. He waggles his eyebrows at Harry, who very purposefully ignores the action.

They both know to keep their words stilted, what with Safaa floating near Louis’s feet. She might not understand the references, if Louis decides to get truly disgusting and graphic with his teasing, but still.

“Hey Lou,” Harry whispers with a roll to his eyes. Sometimes he forgets he hasn’t known Louis his entire life, and that they’re not really friends. But something about Louis settles Harry’s anxious stomach. He feels like Louis has been around since he was a kid. Almost like family.

“So what are we doing today? It’s a Saturday,” Louis turns onto his back to lay fully, throwing his keys up towards the ceiling a few times.

“No plans, I guess.”

“Not gonna… ‘nap’ all day, then?”

“Shut up.”

“I mean, I wouldn’t blame you. By all means, be alone if that’s what you want,” Louis says with a mischievous laugh.

Idly, Harry runs his fingers along Zayn’s spine under the blankets, where he’s still asleep on his stomach. It’s a Saturday, so Harry should probably go on a long run. Read a few chapters for his English class. Be productive. Eat a vegetable or two.

“No, I want to get up and do something. Maybe we can go get ice cream?”

“Not that I can eat any.”

“But you can come. I want you to come. I wanna tease him more. It’s fun.”

“Oh the stories I could tell you, Styles. You have no idea.”

“That’s the beauty of it: we have all the time in the world,” Harry smiles over at him. It’s something Harry thought about the day before, when Louis had him crying from laughing so hard, that now (along with a best friend roommate and a boyfriend) he also has a ghost to be playful with. It’s like after so many years of only running from them, Harry now has one to confide in. His secret doesn’t always have to be the worst thing about him. It can be something to be excited over, sometimes, when Louis pops out of a closet to make him laugh, instead of the usual reaction he has towards ghosts: crippling fear.

Safaa begins bouncing around them, dancing, like she’s twirling in a dress. She’s a true Malik; she must’ve heard “ice cream” and decided to celebrate.

“You too, Saf,” Harry winks to her.

Harry rubs his fingers all the way up Zayn’s back, to feel the hair touching his neck. It’s messy like this, when they first wake up in bed, and it’s Harry’s favorite. Soft, rumpled Zayn with pillow creases on his cheek.

He glances down to watch Zayn sleep for a bit.

But to Harry’s surprise, Zayn is already awake and staring right at him. Harry can’t figure out the look, the one where Zayn won’t blink and reads the lines of Harry’s face like they’re a map. Zayn just watches him.

Harry would kiss him good and hard on the mouth, but his breath is gross. So he shakes his head to ignore that look of Zayn’s for now, and settles for kissing the crown of his head. Zayn moves closer and buries his face in Harry’s chest.

Louis snorts from Niall’s bed.

 

***

 

So about now would be a good “end point.” That’s what Harry thinks to himself as they walk across campus. This happiness he feels, the pure contentment and knowledge that his life wasn’t destined to be terrible, would be a great way to end the book. The End.

Because he’s not stuck in an in-between, he’s not Henry. He’s finally living his life to the fullest, demons or not. They still follow him, ghosts pop out from under beds, a woman pulls his hair one night when he brushes his teeth. He still runs, he still flees. But he’s now vowed to follow Zayn’s advice and ask them to leave. He doesn’t have to be mute and allow the dead to intrude on his everyday life.

He has Niall there to listen to the simple ghost stories. He has Zayn to listen to the bad ones. They both rub his shoulders if it feels too overwhelming some nights, when one tries to pick a fight or kick his ass. They give him chocolate and his phone if he feels like talking to his mom. Safaa warms his hands, Louis giggles to ease the tension, and Zayn holds him close.

So it could be The End, now. After all this time, Harry could finally breathe easy. It was all going to be okay.

But Harry isn’t writing the story, now is he? It’s his real life. And as the poem goes, nothing gold can stay.

It was Zayn to pull Harry out of a bed a few minutes after he woke up and gave that look. He wrapped his long fingers around Harry’s thin wrists and asked with big, doe eyes if he could take Harry somewhere. They got ready quickly, Louis and Safaa ahead of them on the sidewalk, as they make their way south. Harry swings their arms a bit now, squeezes Zayn’s fingers through his glove, as Zayn quietly smokes a cigarette. The leaves have finally wilted, no longer crunchy and brisk like the air. With the frost and impending snow, they lay limp in old drainage runoffs, stuffed in gutters, raked into damp piles. The sky feels too gray, the clouds too thick. Everything looks a little gray now, Harry supposes.

“So where are we going?” Harry wonders, knocking their hips together.

“I want to show you what I do.”

Harry cocks his head to the side.

“You don’t have a job.”

“It’s not my job _now_. Like, not _yet_. But it will be, eventually.”

Zayn sucks on his cigarette, before tilting his chin up to blow the smoke over them. He never lets it blow directly in Harry’s face, which he always appreciates. Zayn says he likes to blow into the wind.

“Social work?”

“Working with kids.”

“I love kids,” Harry smiles.

Zayn just nods, glancing towards his feet.

“Are you okay?” Harry stops them, pulling at Zayn’s arm. They’re near the middle school, almost to the gym.

Harry hates to have noticed, but he can’t help the way his eyes draw over Zayn’s shoulder. Two old women in nurse’s scrubs stare at Harry from across the street, squinting like their eyes are bad or the sun’s obstructing their view. But their eyes are dead and the sun isn’t out, so Harry wonders if they’re stuck that way. One mouths something, a curse word, a string of expletives, while the other wrings her hands nervously. Harry gulps. He doesn’t want to know what they have to say.

Zayn shifts so he can look over his shoulder. He doesn’t see anything out of the ordinary, like always. He turns back to Harry and frowns.

“I’m fine.”

“You’re being quiet.”

“I _am_ quiet,” Zayn gets defensive. “I can be quiet.”

“I remember,” Harry shrugs a bit, the memory of the gangly kid Zayn used to be pushing to the forefront. Quiet, subdued, always looking at his feet. His hair had been so short in fifth grade, a close buzz cut. It made his eyes pop then, made his face look about twice as big. If Zayn hadn’t of gotten in with Marcus McCusker and watched Harry’s torment day after day, maybe they would’ve been friends.

Zayn frowns further.

“Come on, we’re late,” he turns, pulling Harry’s hand.

They end up in a gym attached to the old brick building not far from campus. It’s crawling with kids, which Zayn explains is an after-school program that meets on Saturdays for the parents who work on the weekends. Harry nods along, as Zayn tells him about his social work major and how he has to put in so many hours a week, working with kids, tutoring, mentoring when he’s asked. Harry squeezes Zayn’s hand so hard, the more of his world he shows Harry.

A group of squealing kids run around in circles to play tag, a few girls jump rope, clapping and chanting. A side basketball hoop has been set up, a two-on-two game getting progressively more intense. Not another ghost in sight, now that Louis and Saf have bounced away.

Zayn pulls Harry along as he waves to a few kids he must know. They end up in the far corner where a few tables have been set up, with various middle schoolers hunched over books and papers. Zayn quickly speaks with a teacher, some young woman who blushes when she sees him. When Zayn points to him in introduction, Harry waves to her and she blushes harder.

Eventually Zayn pulls out a chair for Harry to sit in, besides two boys with math homework. One pinches his eyebrow as he scrawls his pencil across the paper, while the other, his brother most likely, stares at his book in contempt.

“Hey,” Zayn grips the kid’s shoulder. “Kyle, this is Harry.”

“Hi,” Kyle nods at Harry politely.

“So what do we have today? Fractions again?”

“Yeah,” Kyle sighs.

“Alright, you know what to do: explain to me how it was explained to you first, and then we’ll work through it.

Harry tucks his hands between his thighs and settles in, to watch. He always hated fractions too. Kyle groans, but reaches for his books to pull them closer.

“Sometimes when something is explained just one way, it can be hard for someone to understand it, when they need it explained a different way,” Zayn says to Harry. “Kyle and I talk it through, to see if his brain needs a different road map. You know?”

Harry smiles and nods. He wants to kiss Zayn, but that’d be inappropriate. Zayn, not one to care much, leans in and gives a quick peck to Harry’s jaw. It’s like now that he’s in his element, all the morning’s weirdness dissipates. Zayn uses his hands to show Kyle something in mid air, like he’s writing numbers up into the space around them. Kyle follows the movements, his eyes suddenly more clear when he doesn’t have a piece of paper to stare at. It’s fascinating, how Zayn figured out how to help Kyle visualize numbers. Whenever he gets a problem right, Zayn squeezes his shoulder. If he gets a problem wrong, Zayn just draws Kyle’s attention away from the paper again, to look him in the eye, to look at his fingers drawing through the air.

It’s beautiful to watch, as Zayn Malik helps someone else who needs it. That’s what he does. He helps everyone, whether it be with math, or a thermostat, or a pumpkin carved like your face, to make you laugh.

Harry learns how to multiply fractions, for probably the second time in his life, and as they leave later that day, he’s pretty sure he could take the same test as Kyle and get at least a B.

 

***

 

“You’re a genius,” Harry says into Zayn’s neck that night, in Zayn’s bed. His bedroom is a complete mess, with clothes everywhere and cold cups of coffee on every surface. Niall had asked them to “fuck somewhere else” for the night so Sabrina could come over to their room, and Harry was all too happy to oblige. Happy roommate, happy life, or something.

“S’just fractions, babe. It’s not fucking advanced differential equations,” Zayn laughs, his hand running up and down Harry’s back.

“Still. Smartest guy I know.”

Zayn just shakes his head. Harry can feel the movement, as he kisses Zayn’s neck up towards his jaw.

“I’m glad you brought me with you.”

“Me too.”

“Are you gonna tell me why you acted so weird beforehand? Or why you wanted me to go so badly?” Harry says as he leans back to look Zayn in the eye.

Zayn moves a curl away from Harry’s eyes.

“I like helping people,” Zayn says quietly.

“I know you do. I’m proof of that.”

“Do you? Like helping people?”

Harry tilts his head, confused.

“You have this… gift, Harry. You have an opportunity to help people.”

Harry has to sit up then, as he presses a hand to his erection.

“They’re dead, Zayn.”

“But _we’re_ not.”

“What are you talking about?”

“The ones they leave behind,” Zayn sits up to fold his legs. “We’re alive. We’re living and breathing, and when our friends or family die, we feel that. For years. It never goes away. It hurts. Don’t you want to help? The _me’s_ of the world?”

“Zayn, what are you saying?” Harry gapes at him.

And Harry will swear it later, but what Zayn says next comes completely out of left field. It’s so far off from what Harry expected, it’s like Harry’s head spins in a full circle right there on his neck.

Zayn blinks, his face blank.

“Louis can’t stay here anymore,” he says simply.

Harry stares at him, like there has to be more to that sentence.

“He died, Harry. He died at seventeen years old, in a hospital bed, surrounded by his friends and family. We laid him to rest. We had a funeral. We grieved. He was supposed to have moved on.”

“But he didn’t. He’s here. He’s with you, and he’s here. Don’t you… he’s here! He doesn’t have to go away,” Harry shakes his head with it, slightly hysterical. Every ghost he’s ever met, he’s ran from. He pushes and pushes, until he’s practically dry heaving, the faster he runs away. And now, the one ghost to prove it doesn’t have to hurt, Zayn wants to get rid of.

“I think I get the Safaa side of it, how she’s… not quite what Louis is, she’s… brighter, a light, a bit of hope for me. And you. And maybe others in my family. I think we can feel her, and we’ll always feel her, and that’s okay. But Lou… this wasn’t where he was supposed to end up. He needs to move on.”

Harry shakes his head. He’s hated the ghosts, he hates all of them, except for one. Harry always thought he couldn’t help any of them, couldn’t talk about it, had to ignore their cries. He’s made jokes to himself about “the light” the ghosts must think he is, or can direct them towards. It was never an actual possibility he ever gave thought to.

“Move on where? There’s… what if there’s nowhere else? What if… what if that’s it?”

“I can’t believe that this is it, Harry. I can’t. Do you really think this is all we have? One little life here on earth and then nothing? The people who die and _don’t_ become ghosts to roam the earth, they just… poof?”

“But – ”

“I think we need to help him. You need to help him. If he has like, unfinished business, or some task that needs to be accomplished, you can help. We can try.”

Suddenly Harry feels Louis, somewhere off in the distance, tucked away in a room in a faraway house Harry has never seen. He’s smiling, wherever he is, sending some sort of message to say he’s good. _I’m alright, H. I’m honestly surprised it took him this long._

“He got sick and he died,” Zayn says with a tremble to his voice. He won’t cry, he won’t let himself, Harry knows. So he keeps his voice hard. “I cried over him for a year. And then I felt better. And then I met you. And I just…”

Louis sighs, somewhere. _Go on, then. I’ll show you._

Harry has to lean towards Zayn, to lay his face on his chest, to comfort the both of them as Zayn pretends not to cry. Harry closes his eyes and focuses. And suddenly he sees it, the flashes of memories Louis must’ve kept from him on purpose.

Best friends. The very best of friends. Two idiots smoking cigarettes, riding skateboards, piercing their ears. Family dinners. Louis accompanying Zayn’s entire family every year, to place flowers on Safaa’s tiny little grave. She was so young when she died, the baby of the family. She was their glue. Zayn spent the rest of his early childhood living in a mausoleum, surrounded by her pictures and his mother’s grief and his father’s quiet anger. There was a period in the fourth grade when Zayn kept pulling at his hair, twirling it around his index finger, over and over, until he yanked the knotted chunks out. He chased the pain, piece by piece, hid the chunks in his pillowcase so no one would see, until the noticeable bald spots got to be too hard to ignore. After that, his mother shaved his head for years because a therapist told her to.

Like Harry, Zayn too had a rough fifth grade year. He couldn’t feel better, he couldn’t talk to his parents about it. It’s not fair to be sad, when the rest of your family is already sad.

But it got better, after a few years. The Maliks put themselves back together piece by piece, and eventually Zayn told his parents how he felt. Guilty for when he laughed at a joke, confused for feeling angry that Safaa died, ashamed for forgetting how she said his name as her first word.

Once they all forgave each other, it got better.

And then Louis got sick the summer before their senior year. He used to joke that he bruised easily whenever he got tackled during a soccer game, and it was sort of funny, in that Louis Tomlinson “it’s not really funny, but we all need to laugh for his sake” kind of way. No big deal. But when he bumped into the corner of his kitchen table, and a bruise sprang up on his entire thigh and hip, it wasn’t so funny.

Leukemia.

Before they even had a set plan to combat it, it had already moved from his blood, and into tumors in his liver and spleen. Lower intestines. Kidneys.

They didn’t attempt much chemo. Louis’s mom wanted to keep him comfortable, in the end.

“He was stubborn as hell,” Zayn whispers, pulling them out of their thoughts. “He loved his Jeep. We used to drive around in it for hours, once he got his license. And when he got sick, after he knew he was never going to get better, he said he wasn’t going out like a chump in the hospital. He used to joke about driving it off a cliff.”

Harry wipes his eyes with the back of his hand, and laughs.

“A few times, I really thought he would try it. On the days he couldn’t move, when he’d bitterly admit he wouldn’t be able to drive, he’d ask me to push him off a cliff. ‘Just make sure I have my keys, Zayno. Gotta have my keys in the afterlife.’”

“He has them,” Harry nods with a sniff. “He loves them.”

“I still have his Jeep at home,” Zayn admits. “He gave me the other set of keys two days before he died. Said I could have it.”

“That’s good. I bet that made him happy.”

_Not so happy when he dented the back bumper in a fuckin’ parking garage._

Harry snorts.

“What?” Zayn kisses his forehead.

“He says you dented the bumper.”

“Fuck off, Lou.”

_Tell him to go fuck himself._

“Go fuck yourself, babe,” Harry says as he leans back. They lock eyes and both roll them, laughing around the wetness they’re ignoring.

“Is he here, then? Is he pissed at me? For what I said?”

Harry shakes his head.

“Not here, specifically. But… he knows. And he gets it. I think… maybe he’s ready, too. Soon. Maybe you’re right.”

Zayn nods, his eyes slightly squinted, like it hurts.“I like to help people. I like to be useful. If you sit around and feel sorry for yourself, or pretend like everything’s fine, it doesn’t do anyone any good.”

“I know.”

“So let’s do it. You and me.”

Harry kisses him, with heat and tongue. They each grip the other’s cheeks and hold on. Partners, the sun and his shadow, two young men with too much heaviness and responsibility. It’s not ideal, but it is what it is.

_It is what it is._

And Harry gets it then, why Zayn reacted so strangely the time Harry said the phrase so many weeks ago in his dorm, as he tried to fix the thermostat. It’s something Louis used to say, when things were especially bad. The medicine and the scans, the radiation they tried in vain, the clinical trial they threw him on in the end. He puked and cried and wasted away to skin and bones, as Zayn sat by his bedside and tried to distract him with comic books.

Louis got tired easily, towards the end, as the bruising under his eyes got darker.

Eventually, Zayn had to let him go. He held Louis’s hand as he settled that last night, their comics wrinkled between them. Zayn had expressed his worry over keeping Louis awake, before cursing the entire universe for how unfair it was. He knew Louis didn’t have much longer.

_It is what it is, and that’s all there is. This is all we’ve got now, so we’ll make the most of it. We’ll talk about comics and action movies and tits and dicks and how we’re both lucky we lost our virginities years ago. Don’t be a twat, and think you can’t cry. Because you can. I won’t watch. And just remember: it could be worse, I think. And we’re still here, together. You’ll find someone new to sit around and have fun with, and I’ll make sure whoever it is, is good enough. A new partners in crime. So… it is what it is, Zayn. We’re lucky to have gotten this far. Lucky fuckin’ ducks, we are._

That was one of the last things Louis said to Zayn, as they bumped fists. He died the next morning. And Harry’s not sure how exactly he knows it, and why Louis wants him to know these last words, but Harry holds onto it. It is what it is.

Harry leans back and runs a thumb over Zayn’s wet bottom lip.

“I love you so much, it hurts,” Harry says in a rush.

“You’re an idiot,” Zayn says, eyes red and amused.

“Never said I wasn’t.”

“I love you too,” Zayn admits on a resigned exhale, almost as if he never really had a choice. He pulls Harry back to his chest. “Come here.”

They don’t fall asleep for a long time that night, tucked in Zayn’s messy room inside a house where three different Pandora stations play from three random rooms. It smells like cigarettes and coffee, with a hint of Gucci and Skittles.

Louis doesn’t make himself known again. He must need to collect his thoughts as well, to contemplate what’s next. If he’ll be ready soon. Harry can’t see Louis, but it feels like wherever he is, he’s smiling.

 

***

 

They don’t bring it up again the next morning, after the emotional toll it took just to discuss Louis moving on. So Harry does what he does best, and gives himself the distraction of tucking himself under Niall’s arm and telling his mother about Zayn.

Anne, naturally, giggles like a schoolgirl when Harry and Niall meet her for lunch. She insists she knew from the start that Zayn was the one, which Niall agrees with tenfold. Harry, in so few words, tells them both to relax with all that “the one” talk, since they’re barely college freshmen and the thought of scaring Zayn off with one more huge _thing_ , seems like a horrifying thought.

Harry doesn’t tell her Zayn already has the burden of Harry’s little “issue” to deal with, along with normal “we just started dating and figuring it out” feelings. Seeing as how he’s getting an even firmer grasp of the after life, he’d very much like his mother to continue being alive and well. Maybe he’ll tell her his secret eventually, some day, but having Niall and Zayn know for now is enough.

And now that he’s normal and well adjusted, Harry would quite like for his mother to have a happy son for a change, no odd behavior or anxiety over how he’ll get through it for the rest of his life.

So as it is, Harry decides to continue to confide in Niall when he can, and Zayn when he absolutely has to.

“I’m so glad you have him,” Niall admits to him as they fall asleep that night in their twin beds. “Your mom sees it too. It’s just _right_ , you know?”

Harry smiled into his pillow, missing Zayn. They had decided to spend time with their individual roommates. Harry won’t admit it’s been torture, not having Zayn around for even a few hours. He’d never hurt Niall’s feelings.

“Go on,” Niall sighs. “Call him and say goodnight. I won’t listen.”

Harry scrambles for his phone where he left it near his pillow.

“Have I told you lately that you’re my best friend?”

“No,” Niall shrugs as he turns towards the wall to settle in. “But I already know.”

Harry’s glad he knows, and glad he’s accepted Harry in all forms, because even when Harry admitted earlier that two little girls were in Niall’s closet singing songs, he didn’t flinch.

Zayn picks up after only one ring, his voice rough like he’s in the middle of a cigarette. Harry can practically see him perched at his bedroom window in his boxers, convincing himself the smoke goes nowhere but out of the crack at the bottom.

In hushed voices, Harry admits he missed him. Zayn laughs because he was about to say the same thing, that after their heavy conversation about Louis, the only thing he wanted all day was hear Harry’s voice. So they talk. Harry listens intently about Zayn’s afternoon and dinner with Sabrina, how she still hates Harry a little, and their views on the upcoming election. And then once they’re finished with the niceties of it all, Harry whispers about how his mom can’t wait to meet Zayn, and what he’d like to do if they were in the same bed. Harry’s cheeks flare red, when Zayn says something especially dirty, his cock twitching precariously. Harry almost wants to grab his running shoes, and head to the house right then and there, when Zayn starts whispering Harry’s name, with a hand around himself.

Niall, not asleep after all, quickly turns over and throws a pillow directly at Harry’s face.

 

***

 

After taking a few days to psyche himself up for it, Harry decides to take what Zayn said to heart, and help when he can. He tries to confront the ghosts who come to him with no ill intent, random people who follow him on the street or in the park. A man steps out of his closet one night when Zayn goes to pick up candy, so Harry tries to engage him, even as his breath cracked in front of his face, ice cold. He tries to talk to them, to ease them into… wherever it is we go, in the end. But inevitably, he freezes up, literally and figuratively, as he gets asked one of the Big Questions he can’t answer.

_Why are we here? How can you see me? Where do I go? I’m scared it’ll hurt all over again. Can you tell me what it all means? What’s the master plan?_

“I never know what to say,” Harry admits to Zayn when he gets back and hands him a box of malt balls. “I feel like I should have concrete answers. More eloquent or something, and not my half-mumbled words of lame ass encouragement, you know? So I just like, stare at them, unsure and scared like a little boy, until they leave. It still feels like I’m running.”

“You’re not running. You’re trying. Just… don’t put so much pressure on yourself. You’re not writing a fucking _book_ , Harry,” Zayn smiles at him. “It’s not like you’re gonna be the next John Edward, with TV specials and speaking engagements. You don’t have to like, sell them on it. Or sell yourself, for what you can do.”

Harry frowned as he thought it over.

“You just have to be honest. You don’t know why you can see them, or how to help them. You just... listen. Maybe they need someone to hear them one last time. And maybe that’s it. Maybe that’s _all_ you can do.”

And with that, Harry goes for a run alone the next day, his thoughts a messy jumble. He slaps his Nikes against the pavement and heaves his way through tree-lined streets. The houses still have their pumpkins out, a tad sunken in now that Halloween has come and gone, but still creepy and leering just the same. A man tries to chase after him near the loop he takes along Lancaster Ave, so he sprints for a full block, before he remembers.

Zayn told him to try it out, so he wipes his nose on the back of his long sleeved Under Armour and tightens his bun.

Harry Styles, for better or worse, makes his way over to a park bench near campus and sits down. The sun hasn’t come out of hiding all day, and as the afternoon dips closer to dinnertime, a chill runs over Harry’s skin. It’s an old part of town, crawling with the lost and dead. They’re everywhere, still walking around like they don’t know they’re dead, running phantom errands, pausing to smile at passerbys who can’t see them, holding hands with no one.

Harry waits.

He’s run long enough. He’s fumbled his words too many times. It’s time.

His hands begin to sizzle, like bacon in a frying pan, as one settles on the bench next to him. A young woman, in running shorts and a sports bra, like maybe it’s July and she’s running to train for a marathon. Her long, black hair pulled into a ponytail, her dark skin beautiful and glistening, the dark, sticky blood running down her left temple barely even noticeable. She sits on her hands, face relatively blank, as Harry tries to calm his nervous energy.

By now, if this were Harry from six months ago, he’d be ignoring her. He’d shut his eyes, pretend he couldn’t see her, or run away. If she spoke to him, the old Harry would’ve done as he’s always done and kept quiet. He’d leave. She’d leave. The hair on his neck would stick straight up for hours. She’d return to whatever in-between place she came from, wherever she stays dormant, cold and stiff. No closure, no peace. It’s like now Harry has Louis, and understands how that might feel, he really, truly wants to help. It’s just hard to say the right things.

She doesn’t say anything right away, so Harry shoves his frigid fingers between his thighs and looks down at his shoes. He waits.

“It isn’t fair,” Maraya finally mutters.

Harry looks up and blinks at her.

“No,” he agrees simply. “It’s not.”

“I keep seeing you. I keep coming to you, near you, and I don’t know why.”

“I don’t either,” he says with a sniff.

Maraya finally turns to him, to look him in the eye. As a common courtesy, Harry turns his body to give her his full attention. He can do this. If this is his gift, or his calling or whatever, he has to. Maybe this is his purpose. Maybe this is the reason for all of it.

“What do I do?” she whispers.

“I don’t think I can tell you that.”

“Where do I go?”

Harry frowns, to really contemplate the question. Now it’s Maraya’s turn to wait. So she does, patiently.

“I think,” Harry says with a slow nod, “that you go wherever you want to go. I think whatever’s next… isn’t bound by time and space. It’s… perfect. For you. You choose where.”

“But what about my sister?”

Harry cocks his head, as the wind blows and whips the little hairs along his temples around into his face.

“I think your sister would be happiest knowing you’ve gone somewhere better. Don’t you?”

Harry can see her, Maraya’s twin sister in her kitchen, stirring a cup of tea with a bent spoon. She’s not crying, she’s not as sad anymore, but a numbness has set in since her other half died. And that’ll take a very long time to get past and work through, being one whole person alone, instead of one-of-two. But there are crucifixes on the kitchen wall, a collection of sorts, her faith solidified and true. She knew Maraya went to heaven, without a shadow of a doubt, with her whole heart. Someone like Maraya couldn’t possibly have gone the other direction.

Maraya blinks at him. She must follow along. She sees what Harry sees.

“Do you think she’ll be okay?” Maraya asks with big, pleading eyes.

“She’ll miss you every day. But I think she’ll be just fine,” Harry nods. Suddenly he’s smiling at her, as warmth settles in his stomach. Safaa’s with Zayn, Harry can feel her with Zayn as he studies a few miles away. But he feels her with him, too. On that bench, next to a dead girl too afraid to move on.

It’s not quite a light that beckons Maraya. It’s not an archangel or saint. There isn’t a choir of singing angels, or pearly gates, or clouds of white to float off into. It’s like one minute, Harry smiles at her and he physically feels her letting go. The grief and confusion she held onto in death, the fear of the unknown, the anxiety over leaving her loved ones… it all trickles down from Harry’s shoulders first, until suddenly it’s like a weight has been lifted. He blinks, sees her smile and whisper _thank you,_ and then the next minute, she’s gone.

Harry sits alone on that park bench, once more, as the sounds around him suddenly return. The vacuum they were in practically explodes, as birds chirp, cars whiz along, and bicycles zigzag around him.

Harry almost cries, when he stands up to crack his back. But he keeps it in. He doesn’t let the emotion erupt until he’s run all the way back to Zayn and hugs him so fiercely to his chest, it almost hurts.

 

***

 

Harry wants to take his time. He grips Zayn’s hands in his, as they stand in Zayn’s room well after midnight, with nothing but a few candles to light the way. He watches the way his fingers move of their own accord, along the backs of Zayn’s hands, along the veins and smooth skin there, up his forearms along the fabric there, to his shoulder blades. He feels the warmth radiating off of Zayn, his hands on his neck, his biceps, his wrists. He envisions the fire inside Zayn’s chest that’s made the evil squirming around in Harry’s feel obsolete.

With shaking fingers, Harry undoes each button of Zayn’s shirt, one after the other. Zayn watches Harry’s face, just stands there and takes it in, like it’s important to keep still. Harry brushes the shirt from Zayn’s shoulders and it falls to the floor. Harry reaches for his own shirt, the one an angry man ripped a hole in once, and tugs it over his head. It’s not very graceful, but Zayn doesn’t laugh.

His skin is fucking gorgeous, the mole on his ribcage like a dot on a map to say _right here, Harry, this is where you belong._ Harry feels Zayn’s waist between his palms, his fingers warming up the more they wander. Along Zayn’s back at the dips on either side of his spine, up to his clavicle, his taut chest, his nipples hard to the touch.

Zayn still doesn’t say anything, and only hisses when Harry’s thumbs dip from his nipples down to the waistband of his jeans and briefs.

Harry sinks to his knees and undoes the zipper, helps Zayn slip them down his thighs. Zayn doesn’t flinch when Harry presses his face into the rough hair above his dick, his hands holding onto the back of his knees, as he anticipates the mess they’ll make of each other. Harry kisses him there, over each hip bone, breathing deeply to get the scent of Zayn imprinted into the fucking folds of his lungs. He wants Zayn in his pores, under his fingernails, tucked next to his beating heart.

Zayn eventually brings a hand to Harry’s hair, to move him back some. With hooded eyes and a half smile, he nudges at Harry’s bottom lip with his other thumb, to open up. Harry obliges and lets Zayn feed his cock into his mouth, achingly slow, like he knows they have the time to spare.

Harry wouldn’t want to draw blood, but he can’t help the way his fingers dig into the backs of Zayn’s trembling thighs. Zayn doesn’t hiss at the pressure, which is a good sign, and barely says a word. Harry doesn’t either, not that he’d try, with a mouth full of dick. It’s just breath. Inhales and exhales from both of them, so deep and labored, Harry feels like a live wire, his bare chest thrumming with electrical current like after a lightning storm. He goes back and forth between sucking hard, using the constricting of his throat to do the work, and pulling back to lick at the head. Zayn’s big, just on the right side of too big, and he’s cut and sensitive and leaking. He tastes like a fucking dream, like toffee and twisty rainbow lollipop from a county fair and blue raspberry rock candy and a cherry Life Saver.

Eventually he brings a hand up to grip Zayn at the base, to apply some pressure, as he speeds up his movements. He rolls his balls in his other hand, licks down to taste them, before flicking his tongue against the slit a few times. It’s wet and sloppy, and Harry probably looks like a mess.

He feels Zayn tense up beneath his hands, almost there, when Zayn grips him by the jaw and pulls him back. Harry almost falls over, his knees aching, as he breathes. He looks up at Zayn with wet eyes, for just a moment, and then he’s being lifted up by the forearms.

Zayn lays him down on his bed, with his bare feet still flat on the floor. He mimics Harry’s position and gets to his knees, to get Harry’s jeans off. Harry, ever the tease, isn’t wearing anything beneath them, and he distinctly hears Zayn growl. He spreads Harry’s legs and gets closer to kneel between them, as Harry props himself up on his elbows to watch. The candlelight sends flickers of heat dancing across Zayn’s jaw, his eyes shining and bright as he looks up at him. Harry almost asks what he wants to do, where they’ll go this time, when Zayn bites his bottom lip and nods. He lifts Harry’s legs up behind the knees, to get his feet on the edge of the bed, and then without even a doubt, leans down to run his tongue against Harry’s hole.

Harry falls back to the bed like he’s been shot in the chest, his arms suddenly over his head, his entire body tensed. His eyes roll as Zayn explores him with his tongue, along his ass, perineum, to the seam of his balls, a few kisses peppered along the underside of his cock. Harry can barely breathe, his lungs heave, it feels so fucking good. No one’s ever done this to him before, and he was definitely not mentally prepared for how it would feel.

His hands curl into fists and he actually punches them against the cold wall behind him a few times, as Zayn sucks and bites at his thighs. He doesn’t stay there long, and soon enough, Zayn dips right back to where he started, his ridiculously huge tongue flat against Harry’s hole. It’s like Harry’s most delicate body part has been completely enveloped by Zayn’s mouth, and Harry truly wonders how the hell he’ll ever get anything done ever again.

In his hazy mind, that’s all Harry can think of.

“I have finals coming up soon, you prick,” he huffs out with a quick laugh, before moaning Zayn’s name six times in a row.

“Excuse me?” Zayn says, muffled in Harry’s thigh.

“Keep going,” Harry shakes his head back and forth. He really is a fucking idiot.

Zayn does, he takes care of Harry like he has since the beginning, his tongue suddenly pointed and firm. He fucks into Harry with it, his breath hot and harsh against the spit along Harry’s balls. He’s relentless with it, Harry’s entire body in motion, like they’re on a fucking life raft. Harry can’t help but pinch at his nipples a bit, which causes his back to arch. He says Zayn’s name another fourteen times, and then he’s coming in hot, thick ropes of white all over his stomach.

Zayn, momentarily distracted by Harry’s orgasm, tries to keep it up, and even gets a finger inside as Harry shakes out the last of it.

“Holy shit,” Harry says in barely a whisper, fingers still pinching at his chest. He keeps his eyes closed, too overwhelmed to open them, as he trembles all over.

“Babe,” Zayn whines, gently gripping Harry’s legs to get his feet back on the floor. “Oh babe.”

Harry feels Zayn kneeling up between his legs again, face pressed into the hip not covered in come, breathing just as harshly.

“That was –”

“That _was_ ,” Zayn nods in agreement into Harry’s suddenly searing hot skin.

“How do you want me?” Harry finally opens his eyes slowly, bringing his wobbly arms down from above his head. He threads his fingers through Zayn’s messy hair, to pull his face up. Zayn raises his head and props his chin on Harry’s stomach, his dick already starting to fill up against Zayn’s cheek.

“I wanna fuck you,” Zayn admits.

“Okay.”

Zayn blinks and nods, moving towards the nightstand. He grabs a bottle of lube from the bottom drawer and stands. He looks down at the wreck formerly known as Harry Styles splayed on his bed, and shakes his head in disbelief. Harry, still on the very edge of the bed, ass practically hanging off it, just smiles. He lifts his legs up, almost as proof that they’re stronger than they look, from all the running he does. Zayn smiles at his idiot boyfriend and helps him, grips each ankle and places them on his own shoulders.

Faster than Harry ever thought possible, Zayn slicks himself up and then rubs a few fingers along Harry’s already-wet ass. He fucks his fingers into him, twice, feels around for his handy work to see he’s good and loose, and then nods like he’s proud of himself.

Harry almost tells him off for being so smug, but doesn’t have the chance to. Zayn lines himself up with Harry’s hole and applies pressure, his thumb and forefinger wet with lube and guiding him in. Harry gasps, like he’s in some dramatic soap opera his mom and grandma used to watch every afternoon. It’s like a searing lick of fire whips him, his entire lower half tearing apart. Zayn tells him he’s doing good, he’s beautiful. He shushes him, tells him to relax, asks over and over if he should stop.

Harry shakes his head. He relaxes a bit, tries to get used to the fullness enveloping him, reminds himself it’s Zayn. Nothing can hurt with Zayn. Nothing is supposed to. Harry’s always so cold, so chilled to the bone, his entire body an icicle. But with Zayn, he lights up. It’s to be expected to feel the heat like this, the fire churning in his ass, his stomach, his chest.

Zayn’s the sun. It’s only natural.

Harry opens his eyes and focuses on Zayn’s pained expression, the hands he has curled around Harry’s ankles protectively. He opens his mouth like he’s about to ask if they should stop. Harry won’t have that. He reaches with his hands to grip the pillow under his head, to hold onto something, and latches his feet together as best he can behind Zayn’s head.

“I want it,” Harry says with a nod. “I promise. Just don’t move yet.”

“I won’t.”

“I know.”

“I swear I won’t,” Zayn babbles, his head nodded. He holds Harry’s ankles in each hand on his shoulders, and says it again. “I swear I won’t.”

A half-century later, Harry inhales and exhales through the searing pain, to find that it doesn’t ache as much if he presses into it. If he uses the leverage from his arms and pulls at Zayn’s neck with his feet, it’s like his other muscle groups know to give into it. He rocks himself a few times, feels the weight of Zayn against him, and feels it. The pain ebbs into half-pain. And then the half-pain dips into a quiet thrum of good.

“Okay,” Harry hears himself say, “go slow.”

Zayn nods, his forehead slick with sweat, his ab muscles dancing in the candlelight.

Zayn doesn’t fuck into him, doesn’t fuck him at all. He just plants his feet farther apart on the hardwood floor and rocks forward, as Harry rocks down. They create a movement all their own, so agonizingly slow, Harry almost regrets not being closer so he can touch Zayn better.

They can read each other so well now; Harry sees the flicker of concern pass over Zayn’s face, right as Zayn sees the small huff Harry exhales. And then fast as anything, Zayn lets Harry’s legs down from his shoulders. He leans down to wrap an arm around Harry’s middle, and without breaking the connection, moves Harry up the bed so he can lay on top of him.

“Hi,” Zayn says, leaning down on his forearms on either side of Harry’s face.

“Hey stranger,” Harry says brokenly, his smile not as wide.

Zayn sees how Harry’s lips have gone completely dry, so he leans in to lick at them and kiss him good. It’s dirty and wet, their hips rocking together as Harry links his feet against Zayn’s flat little ass.

Zayn shifts slightly, and then Harry’s eyes explode in his fucking skull, as a white hot surge of adrenaline or some other fucking chemical surges through his body. Zayn bites at his neck, once he’s found that spot, and nudges at it again and again. Harry feels himself tensing up, his thighs hard as rocks, his stomach and chest about to be coated in come a second time. Zayn must feel it, as he brings a hand to Harry’s cock and strokes him at a quicker pace then they can move themselves. Harry gets lost in it, the wave of pleasure that punches him in the gut.

Zayn coaxes him through it, his lips at Harry’s ear, sweet and in awe. But then a bomb must go off, because then fast as anything, he leans back a bit, so he can seamlessly slip out of Harry.

“Fuck, babe,” Zayn groans, as he reaches to pull himself off.

“Yeah,” Harry whispers, his eyes down between them where Zayn’s hand disappears in movement.

“Fuck.”

“Yeah, babe,” Harry says as he bites his lip, his hands running up Zayn’s back.

Zayn brings his face up to look at Harry, and comes so hard, his expression cracks in two. It almost looks painful, as he _ah ah ahs_ , his come scorching as it lands on Harry’s groin and stomach.

Harry quickly grabs for Zayn, his big palms on either side of Zayn’s wobbling head. He holds him up so he can’t collapse right onto Harry’s spent body, and Zayn blinks a few times, as he drifts back to himself.

“Jesus,” Harry says with a small laugh, his breathing still slightly erratic.

“Yeah,” Zayn agrees.

They laugh for a few more seconds, stuck together by sweat and jizz, right as an old, sappy Dave Matthews Band song starts playing from one of the roommates’ bedrooms.

The whole fucking house probably heard them, which Harry realizes right as he smacks his hands over his bright red face. Niall and Sabrina had mentioned studying at the house tonight, and for all they know, they heard everything from down the hall. Harry smacks at Zayn, who just ignores it and laughs so hard, he almost falls clean off the bed.

 

***

 

Hours later, when the house has gone silent, save for the normal creepy creaks and groans, Harry blinks awake in the half-light.

Underneath three blankets, he has Zayn curled behind him, his hand tucked over Harry’s hip underneath his boxers, and a chill to his exposed skin. It’s almost as if someone flicked Harry’s forehead, or shook him awake, before stepping away.

And sure enough, a teenage boy hides under Zayn’s desk, peeking around the wooden legs of the chair Zayn mostly uses for drying his clothes. Harry blinks at him, his eyes still slightly blurry, and waits.

The boy, who can’t be much older than fourteen, shifts to reveal his face. He has burns covering his cheek, up into his hair, down his neck and shoulder. It’s all bone and muscle tissue, screaming red, singed black in random spots. He blinks at Harry with one eye, since the other hangs out of his skull by a thread, and Harry can’t help the sharp inhale. This is a child, Harry can’t be scared, he can’t let it affect him.

He can’t let it dictate his life. Not anymore.

“Hi,” Harry whispers, careful to let Zayn sleep.

The boy doesn’t say anything.

“It’s too early to talk right now.”

TJ blinks.

“How about you leave this house for now, and then we’ll find a time to talk soon. Would that be alright?” Harry says with an encouraging nod.

And then he’s gone, the room suddenly not as cold, the skin on Harry’s forearms and neck back to normal. Harry has the feeling he may not see TJ again, that what he needed was just the acknowledgement. Harry feels settled, as he envisions TJ moving on to somewhere new. In his sleep, or maybe in the half-sleep Zayn’s become accustomed to from sharing a bed with Harry, Zayn pulls him closer. He nuzzles Harry’s neck, and mumbles something Harry can’t hear.

But Harry doesn’t worry himself over it, and falls back asleep thirty seconds later.

 

***

 

He’s ready on a Wednesday afternoon, as Harry and Zayn get dressed for a party being thrown by the school Zayn volunteers at for class credit. Thanksgiving is right around the corner, and the kids have put together paper-mâché cornucopias and turkeys, made artwork for the season, collected money for the homeless. Some of the classes have invited their volunteers, along with family and friends, to join in for cookies and punch, to donate to the cause.

Zayn had been running late that morning, swirling out of Harry’s room in a flourish of coffee and Gucci. He tossed their shared stick of deodorant at Harry with a wink, and flew out the door to class, before Harry could kiss him good morning. So now, in Zayn’s room as they straighten each other’s ties for the party, Harry hardly notices the energy in the room as he kisses Zayn’s cheeks.

Safaa hasn’t been around as much, Harry noticed recently. He thinks it has something to do with the situation happening at home with Doniya. Zayn mentioned how his older sister lost her job and has had a tough few months. Safaa must know she needs a guiding light, a ball of warmth and joy, to sit with her on her shoulder when it feels especially rough. Safaa truly does go where she’s needed, when it comes to her family.

So really, when Harry felt that familiar sense of contentment and pure love fill up the room, he should’ve stopped kissing his boyfriend and known it was coming from someone other than Saf. He should’ve realized that what Louis wanted all along, for Zayn to belong to someone, to believe in happiness and love again, to be so sickeningly in love and domestic with someone, has happened.

Louis Tomlinson’s unfinished business.

Zayn smacks at Harry’s face to stop kissing him, to leave him be, so he can fix Harry’s tie. It comes with an intense stare, his tongue between his teeth, as Harry smooths his hair. It’s cold as hell outside, and Zayn refuses to close the crack to his window. But even as the cold air whistles inside like a dog’s whine, Harry realizes he doesn’t feel it.

“What?” Zayn questions, eyes bouncing up to the expression on Harry’s face.

“I don’t know,” Harry admits with a simple shrug, his teeth not chattering at all.

Louis snorts.

“Oh,” Harry gets it. “Hello, Louis. Being creepy behind my back again?”

Right as Zayn finishes Harry’s tie, Harry turns around to see Louis sitting cross-legged on Zayn’s desk. He’s smiling so big and bright, it’s like the first time Harry ever saw him in the Bennett window.

“Harry,” Louis nods, with a twinkle in his eye.

“He’s here? Tell him I say hi,” Zayn smiles, looking all around the room in vain. He can never see him, not even the whisper of him. There isn’t a sign of his presence, but it’s cute that he always tries.

“Hey buddy,” Louis says as he fixes his eyes on Zayn. Sometimes Harry watches Louis watch Zayn, and it makes his heart clench in his chest. There’s so much affection there, so much love and friendship that has spanned so many years, it becomes written all over Lou’s face. Harry could live in the look Louis has for Zayn. He could set up camp there forever.

Harry tilts his head and takes it for what it is.

And then Harry frowns.

It’s time.

“Lou?”

Louis just pulls his knees up to his chest, so he can hug them. He won’t stop staring at Zayn, who has now moved to his mirror in his closet, to fix his own tie. Harry gets a few flashes of their childhood again; racing bikes, a broken beer bottle shared between them as teenagers, so many hugs Harry loses count, driving around in Louis’s black Jeep with rap music blaring.

But then Harry gets a few more flashes, of women, young girls, a set of twins chasing after Louis, another set of twin babies who never had the chance to meet him.

Harry blinks and he realizes, too late, that he’s crying.

Louis props his chin on his knees and smiles at him.

_Promise you’ll take care of him. And if you ever meet my mom, tell her I’m happy. Tell her not to be sad anymore, or think it was her fault. It wasn’t._

“Okay,” Harry whispers, nodding. “Promise.”

Zayn must sense it, because then he’s standing behind Harry, holding his hips, looking at his own desk. Worried.

“Harry?” he whispers to him.

_Don’t let him eat just candy for the rest of his life. Big Macs are okay. But toss a few apples his way, too._

“I will,” Harry says.

_You’re his new best friend now. His partner in crime. Make him happy. Don’t ever make him sad._

Harry nods, as Zayn pulls him closer to his chest, confused.

“It’s time for Louis to go,” Harry says, as he turns his head to Zayn. “I think he’s ready now.”

Zayn frowns. He stands there, unmoving, staring at Harry, until finally, he nods too. He looks over towards his desk, to the clutter and books he hasn’t opened. An old cup of coffee, a letter he hasn’t sent to aunts overseas, a full ashtray. That’s all Zayn must see there on his desk. And it kills Harry, that Zayn can’t see his best friend one last time.

But Zayn was right before; he mourned Louis and laid him to rest. It’d be selfish to keep him around now, to expect him to. So he does what he always does and pretends not to cry. He sniffs and steps forward, so all Harry can see is the back of his head.

Zayn shifts a few times, unsure.

“Gonna miss you,” he admits sadly, shoving his hands in his pockets. “Again.”

“I’m sure I’ll be watching,” Louis tries to smile. “From wherever I am.”

“He’ll watch over you,” Harry whispers, as translator.

“Better not watch me in the shower though, y’fuckin creep,” Zayn laughs, his voice wet and unsure.

Louis snorts and rolls his eyes.

“You wish.”

Zayn tilts his head down, probably to look at his shoes. Louis begins to fade a bit, like when he leaves the room all at once. Usually he’s gone in the blink of an eye, but this time, wherever he’s drifting to, he’s in no hurry. Harry watches him, as he laughs and cries at the same time, his keys suddenly in his hand.

He twirls them around his index finger like a pro, and nods towards Harry.

Zayn sucks in a labored breath, and says it right as Louis moves on, to his new home, to whatever beautiful place he’s created for himself.

“Lucky fuckin’ ducks, we are.”

“We sure are,” Louis says in a whisper of a whisper.

Harry moves forward, to mirror Zayn’s stance from before. He grips Zayn’s hips and holds him close to his chest, with his mouth on Zayn’s warm neck. He stays there as Zayn settles with it, as they take in the fact that they’re truly alone.

 

***

 

Harry makes his way up the few steps of the townhouse first, with Zayn hot on his heels and Safaa close behind. The temperature has dropped to frigid levels, so the both of them made sure to wrap up in coats and scarves for the quick trek across the South Street Bridge towards the Graduate Hospital neighborhood.

The house on St. Albans boasts original 1800s brick. The wrought iron gate clinks behind them, as Harry nervously knocks on the door. Zayn keeps close, his gloved hand on Harry’s hip, squeezing gently.

Harry nods to himself, to remember what Zayn said to do.

“They may not believe you. They may yell, or scream, or threaten to call the police. So we just… we make it quick. Polite and sincere, clear and concise,” he said before they left the dorms. “And I’ll be right there if you need me.”

“Okay.”

“You’ve helped a ghost, now let’s help a family, yeah?” Zayn grabbed Harry’s pea coat by the lapels, to pull him close.

“Yeah, you and me,” Harry agreed, as he gripped Zayn’s coat right back.

Harry kissed him for it. He kissed him and shoved every thank you possible into it, for the much-needed pep talk. Zayn always seems to know what Harry needs. He also hoped the kiss conveyed the sheer relief he felt at having a partner for this kind of thing. Harry might be the one to see the ghosts, but it’s Zayn who helps people. It’s Zayn who solves problems, fixes what’s broken, eases the pain. They haven’t even done anything yet, and Harry already knows: this is a partnership, and it won’t be the only time.

As they walked out of the door to Harry’s building, Zayn pinched his ass, because they’re still idiot freshmen, too horny for their own good.

Micah, the one leading the way, rolled his eyes and told them to hurry.

So now they wait on the doorstep of Micah’s house, as he stands near the street, anxiously wringing his hands together. He found Harry the day before, as he walked out of the testing center. Harry felt the energy shift around him, and it wasn’t just from the wind. He felt it, the pain and sorrow emanating off of someone close by, a man, a young man only a few years out of college. Tanned, gorgeous, the type of clean-cut boy Harry used to drool over when he’d flip through his mother’s People magazines.

He didn’t approach Harry at first. But Harry knew he was being followed, could hear his quick footsteps a few paces behind him on the lit path towards Zayn’s house. When Zayn answered the door with a grin and a quirk to his eyebrow, Harry shook his head and thumbed at the stranger over his shoulder.

Zayn knew immediately, because Zayn knows everything. So he held the door open for Harry and peered out to his empty front yard, shivering.

“If you’d like to come in, we’ll be in the kitchen,” Zayn stated clearly, still holding the door for a few seconds.

And sure enough, ten minutes later as Zayn finished some eye-watering spicy chicken dish on the stovetop, Harry inhaled sharply, from the change in temperature and the shifted energy. Zayn knew they had a visitor.

Micah was shy at first, sad, resigned to his fate. He’d been alone for weeks, wandering the city, trying in vain to get his family to hear his voice. He just wanted to tell them something. One simple thing.

His unfinished business.

He’d been on vacation with his best friends in Mexico, their third trip of the year. They’d gone cliff diving at some famous spot in Mazatlan. Micah swore to Harry over and over that he’d done it before, and he knew how. He wasn’t irresponsible, or drunk, or stupid about it. He did exactly as instructed: up and out, down to the water below, like he could fly.

For whatever reason, he never made it back to the surface. He drowned there in the water, in his favorite aqua blue swim trunks, with a sunburn on his nose and the necklace his older sister gave him around his neck.

Harry and Zayn barely ate their food, as Harry listened to his story intently, and gave Zayn the finer points. And like ghosts before him, Micah asked Harry to deliver a message. To talk to his parents. To tell them something important. Harry gripped Zayn’s hand under the table and nodded.

Now at his house, Micah bounces from foot to foot, in his ridiculous swim trucks, his blonde hair blowing past his shoulders. Safaa doesn’t quite know what to do with his nervous energy, so she sticks close to Harry’s cheek. Zayn reaches around Harry, to knock on the door harder. Micah said they’d be home.

Finally, a woman opens the door. Renee. There’s something about her that makes Harry unbelievably sad. The hunch to her shoulders, the way her hands lay mostly limp at her sides. Her eyes, her hair, her expression, all look limp and weighed down. Like any joy she’s ever had suddenly left and deflated her entirely.

“Hello,” she gives a tight, polite smile. “Can I help you?”

Harry hears Micah step closer, up the two stairs, to see over their shoulders. Zayn’s hand tightens on his hip. Micah’s breath hits Harry’s ear and he almost recoils away from it. It’s too cold. Too sad.

“Hi,” Harry says. “Uh, my name is Harry. And this is Zayn.”

Zayn reaches around again, to shake Renee’s hand and say hello.

Renee, in nothing but an old Penn sweatshirt and jeans, hugs her arms to her chest from the weather and looks at them expectantly. A TV plays somewhere behind her, the sounds of a knife on a cutting board. Micah said they’d be eating dinner. It’s a Tuesday, so it was spaghetti night. Garlic and oregano swirl with the wind around them, and Harry can’t help but inhale it.

He’s not sure how to start, or how to do this.

“We knew Micah,” Zayn says for him, in a quiet, clear voice.

“Oh,” her face falls. “Oh, well that’s… ”

A man comes up behind her and lays a steady hand on her shoulder, eyes set. Dr. Richard eyes the two strangers on his doorstep and takes in the fact that his wife has started to cry, and suddenly Harry feels nervous.

“You knew my son?” he asks with a hard voice.

“Say it’s from school. Say you knew me from Syracuse,” Micah rushes, moving around Harry to get closer to his parents.

Zayn can’t help with this part, so Harry steels himself.

“From Syracuse,” Harry parrots.

“Were you at the funeral?” Renee says as she wipes at her upper lip, eyes wide and expectant now.

“You were in Europe. You were studying and couldn’t make it,” Micah says.

Harry nods, but doesn’t look at him.

“We were studying abroad in Europe and couldn’t make it back in time. I’m so sorry for your loss. We… he was a great guy.”

“Thank you,” Richard nodded to Harry first, then Zayn. “He… Yes, he was. Thank you.”

Micah begins to cry, big wracking sobs like he’s been holding onto them for weeks. He reaches a hand out and tries to touch his mother, but she doesn’t feel it. No one ever really does, except Harry. It starts to feel overwhelming, the emotions Micah can’t help but throw Harry’s way, the grief and sadness radiating off of all three of them. Harry actually gets a bit dizzy. It’s not like with the girl on the bench, who kept it mostly together. And her sister wasn’t with them, as she got ready to move on. It wasn’t this intense. Harry feels himself start to sway, his head too light.

So Zayn, as always, saves the day.

“Micah loved you very much,” he says with assuredness. His voice rings out around the little group congregated on that doorstep, and it’s like a song. Zayn’s voice is just so beautiful, so relaxing and at-ease, Harry swears he can feel it. Micah actually begins to stop his crying, to watch Zayn, as he reaches a hand to Richard’s shoulder.

Maybe Zayn gives warmth to anyone he touches, because Richard, a man twice Zayn’s size, visibly curls into it like it’s a relief.

“He used to tell us all about his family, and how amazing you all were. His parents and his beautiful sisters. Supportive and generous. Loving. Happy,” Zayn says with a small smile.

Harry nods next to him, still at a loss.

“Did you want to come in?” Renee grabs for Harry’s hand, eyes bouncing back and forth to both boys.

“We can’t stay,” Harry admits, too worried for how he’ll feel once truly inside Micah’s world. That might be something to work up to, eventually.

“Another time, then,” Renee smiles wetly.

Zayn’s just about to open his mouth, to fully bring it home, when Harry reaches for the hand on his hip and squeezes. Safaa surges a bit, her light almost blinding in its power. He can do this. He needs to do this, to be the catalyst, the messenger, the boy they all come to find because they can’t help it. It’s time he start doing something with what he’s been given.

“There’s something else,” Harry says, voice measured. “Something he wanted you to find.”

Richard and Renee both curl together, their hands clasped.

“You haven’t cleaned out his room yet,” Harry says, as they stare at him.

Their _how did you know that?_ expressions almost make Harry lose his nerve, but he needs to get it out. Micah sniffs next to him and nods, his face a mess. He can’t take his eyes off his parents, the ones who taught him how to ride a bike and drive a car. They gave him his first flight to Australia, quizzed him and his sister Kate in Italian before they jetted off to study there, invited the girl from Spain to visit for the holidays last year when Micah said he loved her. Harry almost cries with him, as he flashes to memories and snippets, like a film reel.

“There’s an old cigar box in the third drawer of his desk. It was his grandpa’s.”

Micah’s parents begin to cry outright, and Zayn steps closer to Harry.

“He knew Kate’s boyfriend was going to propose soon, probably this spring. John had talked to him about it. So… he had written a speech already, for the wedding reception. It’s for Kate. For you. And… he just wanted you to know it was there.”

Richard nods, his chin wobbling uncontrollably, as his wife turns her face into his chest. She cries, her fingers scrambling for his sweater, and Micah tries to touch her again. Harry can feel the emotion starting to overwhelm him, he needs to go. And Zayn knows, so he begins to back them away, and down the stairs.

“Thank you,” Richard calls to them, with a sad wave. “And you come back and visit any time.”

“Thank you, sir,” Zayn nods.

Harry tries to wave, his hand making a weird movement in the air, and then they’re back on the street. They walk away quickly, hand in hand, with Safaa bouncing beside them, before Micah’s family can ask any more questions.

Harry has to heave a few breaths as they cross the bridge back towards home. Without Micah’s weight on top of him, he can breathe. He can feel Zayn talking him down, like that first night in his dorm when he lied about asthma. He lets him. Harry knows now, more than ever, that if Zayn is there to tether him, he has to take it.

Zayn kisses each cheek, his chin, his forehead, and whispers how amazing Harry is, for doing that for a strange family. Harry pulls him in for a hug, and that’s where they stand, on a freezing cold bridge, wrapped up together, when harry knows it’s for real. Whatever they’ve created together, whatever partnership they’ve started, it’s real. Long haul type stuff.

Partners in crime. Just like Louis intended.

Micah doesn’t follow them. Harry knows he went inside to sit at his kitchen table one last time, as his parents tried to pretend to finish dinner. It lasted about three minutes, before they both climbed the stairs, to set foot in his room for the very first time since he died a few months before.

He watched them sit on his bed, feel his favorite blanket with trembling fingers, as they reached for the cigar box. They read it together, and cried, and then called their other children. Micah watched and smiled from ear to ear, his letter finally in the right hands. His words didn’t get forgotten, his devastated parents had a reason to smile again, for a few minutes. Kate didn’t have to wonder if her brother would be at her wedding, because now she knew, they all knew, that he would be. It would take a long time for the family to get through the day without crying over his loss, but the future looked a tad bit brighter, once those strangers showed up on the doorstep.

Micah moves on the next morning, after spending more time with his family. He visits Harry, for just a few seconds, to wave goodbye. Harry doesn’t hear the _thank you_ , so much as he feels it, deep down to his core.

Harry needs to say it out loud, though. So he presses his own thank you into Zayn’s neck that night, after they gorge themselves on rocky road and leftover pumpkin-shaped Reese’s. Zayn kisses it into Harry’s hair, the thank you of his own, his thoughts straying to Louis and Safaa, his guardian angels, near and far.

The temperature drops a few degrees about then.

But it’s almost December, the dead of winter.

And that’s the best thing Harry’s learned so far in college. Beyond the beauty of sugar and pancakes dipped in strawberry milkshakes and the fact that Zayn is the The One, that’s been the best realization: sometimes, when it gets cold, when his fingers freeze and shake, it really is _just_ the weather.

 

***

 

Harry still swears the loop in the crawl space was the worst one. And even though he doesn’t blame Zayn, he still won’t say much about it, other than it was bad, there were two men trapped in there, and they were awful human beings.

Zayn never presses the line of questioning. He’s learned to trust Harry when he says something is too scary to think about. But that’s Harry for you, full of contradictions. Because one of his recent favorite scary movies features a man trapped inside a box underground, gasping for air and running from the ghosts inside his head. Harry, with caramel and chocolate all stuck in his teeth, grinned at Zayn and reminded him how he has “layers.”

That received quite the snort from Zayn, because his boyfriend is an idiot.

But it also made him think a bit, because he likes to think he has layers, too. That’s why they work together so well. Hot and cold. Loud and quiet. Jack the Ripper and the hero. Even when they bicker, Harry pushes while Zayn holds tight. Harry doesn’t think he’s a bad person, not anymore, and Zayn almost smacks him for even thinking he could be.

Sometimes they’re slow with it, like the first time, and other times it’s hard and fast. They’ll be at a party of Niall’s, and Zayn will say something lame like, “So you wanna get out of here? You can pretend to hate me, and I can pretend to annoy you, and then we’ll fuck like we’re mad about it?”

Sometimes, it’s hard. But in between horrible incidents and scary corpses, tucked around creepy corners and behind walls of bodies, they laugh. Harry sometimes gets sucked into a half-loop, before eventually pulling himself out of it. They still come for him, the shadows with ill-intent. They still scratch and bite and choke, if Harry gets too trusting and lets the mean ones get close. But then Zayn pulls him back, tucks him under his arm, and dabs at the cuts with cotton.

They work because they have balance. Harry says they’re an eclipse, even thought Zayn thinks it sounds ridiculous.

Harry sees ghosts. He can get a peek into the past. Zayn hasn’t seen or a felt a ghost his entire life. And he likes to think he can see the future. A house, rings, a kid or four, matching careers is social work and community service, now that Harry chose his major. He hasn’t said any of it to Harry just yet, but he will. After all, they’re still only freshmen.

Life goes on. They become partners in their little mission, to help those around them who need it. Ghosts _and_ the living. They follow a kind of script now, one they wrote up together, when a ghost comes to Harry for help. They do it how they did for Micah’s family, like they’re old friends with a loved one, sent to give a message long forgotten while they were alive. They may work up to talking to a ghost with a loved one present, if Harry can stomach the emotional toll it takes. It could take time, but they’re in no hurry. They’ve got all the time in the world.

Louis never visits again, because he doesn’t have to: Saf makes sure Harry knows when he’s thinking about them. He still loves how she never strays too far from Zayn, who is still her favorite.

It’s damn near perfect, even when the temperature drops to arctic temperatures every night, and they have to sleep in Harry’s small bed together in a perfect four-shape. Because even when it’s fucking freezing and Harry shakes in his arms, Zayn never complains.

 

   


	5. Epilogue

 

The picnic table doesn’t have the same luster it once did, back when they first met. Erik remembers less graffiti, hardly any carvings or initials in the wood. But then again, this part of town has changed so much. When they met, the picnic tables and benches near their brand new office building were also brand new. But it’s more settled in now, near a high school, so it’s to be expected. Nothing gold can stay, after all.

Like so many memories Erik holds onto of theirs, it feels tarnished.

Erik opens up the brown bag he brought with him, perched there on their table. A thermos, a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, and some carrot sticks. It was their first shared meal, all those years ago, when they finally sat next to each other at the same table. They’d sat at opposite tables for weeks, sending sweet glances and shy smiles, until finally, mercifully, Amanda hopped up and joined him.

She said it was because they’d gone long enough without speaking, but Erik suspects she saw him without a lunch and took pity on his stomach growling. The first time it had been a thermos of juice; since then, on the year anniversary, they’d switched to red wine.

He finds himself staring at the food, not much of an appetite. This tradition has never been one to celebrate, not for the last two years. Not since she left him all alone. Not since all their plans died because she did. They still had so much left to do, to say, to see together. He shouldn’t have come here.

Erik sniffs a bit as he stares at the food morbidly. He should just go home.

And then before he can question it, a man sits down next to him. He smiles, like they’re old friends. Erik eyes the stranger, unsure if they know each other from the firm, or perhaps through school. Old friends? A man he met at a party? He thinks he’d remember this face: mid-thirties, cheekbones, olive skin, a few lines around his eyes, specks of grey in his beard and hair.

Erik doesn’t recognize him. He’s just about to get up, when the man speaks.  

“This may seem very odd to you, but can I speak with you for a moment?” he says with a calm, collected voice. His voice is strong, but his tone is gentle. A bit like how the man’s body language and demeanor come off, to be honest.

Erik should leave, lest he be roped into a conversation about money or a pyramid scheme, maybe even a cult.

“Uh, yeah sure,” he stammers instead, stomach in knots over this stranger’s set eyes. He doesn’t make to move out of his seat.

“Do you see that man over there?” he points across the street, to a similar picnic table, where another man sits alone.

“Yeah?”

“He’s someone very special to me.”

“Uh, okay…”

“Do you see what he’s doing?”

Erik squints across the sparse lanes of traffic. The other man looks just as gorgeous, with long flowing hair and a sweet smile to match. His jeans look a little tight, his laugh a little too loud, as he sits by himself. He gestures with his hands, like he’s giving someone directions, or telling the funniest story he’s ever heard. He crosses his legs then, and leans to his left, like someone about to hear a secret. But he’s alone.

“He, uh… it looks like he’s on a Bluetooth, maybe? Or… well honestly, it looks like he’s talking to himself,” Erik can’t help but admit, even if it sounds rude.

The man smiles at him though, and wrinkles his nose a bit.

“He’s not, actually. He’s talking to someone else. Someone very special to _you_ , I think.”

A breeze skirts across their skin, making Erik grip the thin jacket across his chest. She was the most special person he’d ever met, and this is their spot, their day, and now a stranger starts talking to him about someone special.

“Excuse me?” Erik says, as he feels his heart begin to race, his mind flashing to Amanda’s face.

The stranger smiles, his eyes warm, his cheeks pink from the crisp spring air. Erik doesn’t feel unsettled next to this man, but he feels something. Like an inkling of a feeling, a nagging memory, something he forgot to write down and is now trying to remember.

The man sees his eyes, the cogs turning in his head, and he holds out his hand.

“I’m Zayn. And that’s Harry. And he would very much like to meet you.”

Erik looks over at the man across the street. He stops talking into thin air, and instead smiles over at him. Somehow Erik finds himself smiling back, a bit. It’s like they’ve been friends for years, like the space between their two shared smiles has spanned a whole lifetime.

The wind somehow becomes stronger, goose bumps erupt on his arms, the hair on the back of his neck stands straight. If he didn’t know any better, Erik could swear she was right there whispering in his ear on a cold day.

The strange man Erik can’t help but trust leans closer.

He smiles.

Erik leans in even further, like this man is a raging bonfire on the coldest day of the year.

“Like I said, I’m Zayn. And that’s Harry. And we’re here to help you.”

 

  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for sticking around with me as I wrote this story. xo G
> 
> [Twitter](http://twitter.com/this_onegoes/)   
>  [Tumblr](http://this-onegoes.tumblr.com/)


	6. The Root of It All

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is a look back at Zayn and Louis, before the story of "Wash You Away." It's sort of its own little story.
> 
> I hope you enjoy it.
> 
> xx

_…a few years ago_

 

 

They don’t start laughing until Zayn gently closes the door, right after Margaret and Dillon step into the hall in a slight daze. Louis first, because it was his idea, and then Zayn, until they’re gasping for air and holding onto the bed’s railing to keep steady. To anyone watching, they’d look like maniacs, two young boys in striped tshirts, practically pissing their pants from laughter.

Sometimes Zayn’s surprised he has the capacity to laugh anymore. But then his best friend twists his nipple and says “get a grip,” and suddenly the sun is out and there are things to giggle at after all.

Never let it be said that Louis Tomlinson went quietly.

He knew he was dying and he knew he had to keep everyone’s minds off of it. He knew how to keep it light, how to be exactly how he’s always been: loud and annoying. It’s like he refused to go down without getting into more and more trouble every day, just like old times. Zayn knew what he was doing, by being his own distraction, and he let him have it. So every day after school, he would ride his bike as fast as he could to the hospital, to sit by Louis’s side as he plotted new and interesting ways to make his nurses lives’ harder.

He smeared ketchup on his face like he was bleeding. He walked the entire length of the children’s wing with his IV, just so the nurses would think they lost him. He ate too many Hostess cupcakes and puked in the trashcan near the sink, told them his insides were turning to tar. Louis was a brat in every sense of the word.

There was even the time he pretended to flat line, when one night he removed the pulse indicator from his index finger. He whispered for Zayn to watch, while his sisters went to find a snack, and shoved the whole thing under his lower back as he held in a smile. The nurses rushed in yelling about “code blue” and “get the ventilator,” while Zayn covered his mouth with both hands like he was horrified instead of laughing until he cried. Lou’s mom almost murdered him for that one, smacked him right upside the head, because let it also not be said that Jay Deakin let her son forget how much of a fucking moron he was, all the way until the end.

Zayn collapses onto the hard-as-fuck window seat near Lou’s bed and holds his stomach. Louis almost falls off his hospital bed, his IV tubes all tangled up in his hand, as he wipes away the tears.

“They had no idea,” Lou stutters between labored breaths, “that _that_ was what they’d get in this hospital room.”

“Their faces!” Zayn screeches in laughter.

The look on both of their old friends’ faces, when Louis asked with a totally serious expression for them all to have an orgy, was honestly priceless.

The things they did _after_ Louis asked, when it became too interesting of an idea to pass up and they were all a little delirious, were even more priceless. Hell, it sounded fun. Like maybe all four of them needed a little fun. And it was so late on a Friday night, the hospital staff was down to its skeleton crew, and Zayn had permission to stay over night. So they just… let some stuff happen.

Zayn had never gotten off while two other people in the room were also getting off, so it was a new experience. Dillon seemed to enjoy it, at least.

It was a nice experience to have in general, with Louis. Sometimes Zayn catches himself thinking _this will be the last time we do this_ , with anything and everything, and it’s so depressing, he can barely get out of bed in the morning. Like when Louis was allowed to leave the hospital the weekend before, with an oxygen tank and a portable IV drip. Since Louis wasn’t allowed to drive, Zayn took his keys and they drove around for hours, Zayn smoking double the cigarettes since Louis “was all boring and practically dead already, his stupid lungs wouldn’t work anymore.”

Zayn almost started to cry when Louis said that. But he refuses to cry. Not when he’s alone, and especially not when he’s around Lou. Lou doesn’t deserve to see any more people crying over him, holding his hand and praying to whatever God they saw fit, as he just sat there, numb to it all. Lou had accepted his impending death, and as he said, he’d quite like it if people would “shut up and let me get on with it.”

Louis didn’t want to die, but he also didn’t want to continue living with his insides shutting down one organ at a time. It wasn’t right, for someone so vibrate and colorful, to be brought down to a gaunt face and a grey tone to his skin. It didn’t look right. It was like the universe knew: _hey we fucked this up, we better let him go soon, he’s almost ready._

Suddenly through his laughter, Louis starts to cough, his lungs shriveling up. He bends over at the waist and hacks one up into his hands. Zayn hurries over to his bedside, tries to hand him a glass of water. But Louis waves it away, shakes his head like it’ll pass soon. But it won’t, Zayn knows it, so he gingerly reaches for the oxygen mask Louis swears he doesn’t “always” need.

Zayn shifts the elastic around Louis’s head, to move it down into place over his nose and mouth. Louis tries to wiggle away at first, but then gives in. He takes it into his hands and tries to suck in the air, to breathe in oxygen and pretend like he’s just tired after a rough game of football. Or maybe he had just run away from a girl who kicked him in the nuts for not calling her back. Maybe he had hiked with Lottie earlier and was just a little winded.

But it’s started to take longer and longer for Louis to get back to a base line. To his “normal,” with his oxygen levels as they should be, his heart rate steady, his smile plastered on his face. It takes minutes upon minutes, of Louis laying back in bed, his mask over his face as he shut his eyes tight, to concentrate. To breathe, breathe, breathe.

The cancer has now spread to his lungs and lymph nodes. That’s what the doctor said a week ago, that he had masses growing in his lungs. They even heard him say out in the hall to Jay, “Please try to prepare yourselves.”

_The end is nigh._

Zayn tries to control his own breathing, his own heart rate, at the sight of his deteriorating best friend. His hair had started to grow back once they halted the chemo treatments. But he still looked grey, aging too fast, his cheeks too sunken in. His hands shake when he reaches for his stolen bottles of Coke. He can’t get up to go to the bathroom by himself anymore. He often needs help eating.

Zayn was a bit too preoccupied with Dillon to fully look over at Lou and Margaret. But Lou was good at hiding his true condition from others. He could fake it for a bit. So if Zayn had to guess, if this was the old Louis, he’d say something like, “It was a pretty good blowjob, and I of course fingered her until she came, which was quick and efficient, if I do say so myself.”

Or maybe how “even as I’m dying, I still get all the hot ones off.”

But Louis doesn’t give any dirty details, Zayn doesn’t ask. He lets Louis focus.

Zayn bites his lip, suddenly choked up like a fucking idiot, at the thought of Louis’s last encounter with a girl. How he was right there for it, right next to him, and he couldn’t be creepy and listen. But he’s sort of glad he was there. There are times when he thinks if _I’m not here to see it, or record it to memory, no one would ever know who Louis is._

No one would know his hospital pranks or final jokes about their old friends from middle school. No one would know about the angry outbursts, when he says it’s not fair that he has to die and no one else in his life does. How he was supposed to have a kid someday, some little shithead just like him, to show how to throw a baseball. Get married. Retire and buy a fucking boat down in Florida, just because he could, and die on the fucking thing, while he’s fishing for dinner at age seventy. Zayn always held back from crying, whenever Louis went to the bad place and started screaming about how fucking unfair it was.

But all of a sudden, it’s like Zayn can’t stop it. He thinks of an elderly Louis on a boat, fishing because he said it was freeing, and he feels tears welling up behind his eyes, his hands in fists down at his sides.

“Stop making that face,” Louis’s muffled voice comes from within the oxygen mask.

Zayn’s eyes snap up to meet his, his mind elsewhere, and clearly not focused on his own expression. He’s supposed to be better about that, about not upsetting Lou or upsetting himself. He saves that for when he’s home and he’s smoking one after the other up on his roof to look at the stars. That’s where he does his thinking: _where will I be in a year, where will he be, what’s even the fucking point, why are we here if it all ends in death and sadness and pain?_

“Sorry,” Zayn mumbles, his lips twitching like he could maybe smile.

Slowly, Louis blinks at him. He must be exhausted as he lies there propped up in bed. He’s lost so much weight, as his tshirt practically hangs off his body and his wrists are as frail as a child’s. Sometimes it physically hurts Zayn to look at his friend this way. His dad keeps telling him to give himself a break every few days, take some time off to sleep or relax, instead of cooped up in the hospital and stuck at a bedside.

But he can’t. He won’t.

Louis tilts his head somewhat, like he’s trying to understand something. He removes the mask and slowly hangs it up on the IV stand, like he’s okay again. Like he can breathe just fine, thank you. Zayn feels like he’s on trial, like he’s been caught doing something he’s not supposed to do, as Louis stares at him.

“Come here,” Louis says softly, his eyes drooping.

Zayn exhales. He knows what he means, because they’ve done it twice before, on especially hard days. When Zayn tries to be the anchor, the comfort, that Louis needs during this rough time. When he’s spitting up blood and peeing blood and telling his mom not to look, that _it’s not that bad, I’m alright, I swear._

Zayn goes to hit the lights, to make the room as dark as possible. If they wait until it’s really late, the stars outside of the massive hospital window actual seem to shine a bit. And then he crawls up onto Louis’s hospital bed, to curl under his arm in the least gay way possible. He rests his head on Lou’s chest, wraps an arm around his middle, and tries to avoid pinching any of the IV tubes. He also tries to ignore the incessant beeping of the various machines behind the bed. The sounds that mean Louis is still wonderfully alive.

He sniffs, holds it in some more, even as he knows it’s no use. Whatever control he’s tried for, it’s no use. The dam is about to break.

Louis rubs at the hair around Zayn’s ear and hums a bit, some song Zayn would probably recognize, if he still enjoyed things like music. Zayn closes his eyes and settles in, curls a foot around Lou’s ankle, and dozes for a few minutes. It’s quiet at this time of night, when all of the babies in the NICU are asleep and the kids across the hall have taken their final meds of the day. It’s a night when Lou begged his mom and stepdad to go home, to please sleep and give him a night of “raucous fun with his best friend” and Zayn’s glad they both want to savor it.

Even the nurses are quiet over night, no small talk or squawking about how Lou would feel better soon. No, the night nurses only come in to check Lou’s vitals here and there, as if they could do anything to stop the inevitable. They’re just “keeping him comfortable” now. Louis hates that phrase.

“You doing okay?” Zayn wonders out loud, to make sure Lou doesn’t need anything. He can get him anything he asks for, he always does.

“I’m okay,” Louis says gently. His voice doesn’t have much volume or weight to it tonight. When he’s not yelling or laughing, distracting the whole floor with his shenanigans, he’s whispering.

“Good.”

“I wish you wouldn’t worry about me,” he says in another whisper.

Zayn closes his eyes again and tries to focus on his breathing. He’s so lucky. His lungs work so well, so beautifully, it’s a shame he gets to have them and Louis doesn’t.

“I can’t help it,” Zayn mumbles, trying to keep his voice level so he doesn’t give it all away.

“I know, buddy.”

A few more minutes of dozing, a few coughs and sniffs and winces from Louis. Zayn wonders if he should move to the window, where most nights he does up a makeshift bed with hospital blankets and a random Pillow Pet one of the twins brought. It’s a bumblebee and it’s ridiculous.

But Louis holds him tighter, keeps him in place, like he can read Zayn’s mind like a fucking creep.

How he does that, Zayn will never know. Louis can read him like an open book. He knows Zayn’s every mood, every expression. He knows all of Zayn’s stories, his funny ones and sad ones and embarrassing ones, because he was right there to witness it all. They’ve been best friends for so long, it’s like they’re two halves of a whole. Zayn’s not sure how he functions without Louis around, to make him laugh or smack him in the dick when he’s being sulky. The first person to touch Zayn’s dick was actually Lou’s cousin. The only person, other than Zayn’s family, that has been to Saf’s grave is Louis.

It’s Louis. Everything comes back to Louis and who they are together. They were supposed to spend years and years together, going to college and maybe med school for Lou because he’s fucking smart. They were going to have more matching tattoos, ones they wouldn’t have to hide from their mothers on their ass cheeks like the first ones. Weddings, Best Man speeches, first kids, first houses, first new car purchases. Louis, who loves his Jeep more than anything on the fucking planet, would still sell it in a heartbeat if it meant he could have a brand new, never before owned car. For any young man, that’s the dream.

Before he can comprehend it, Zayn is crying. Big, fat crocodile tears spilling from his eyes down onto Lou’s tshirt. He’s sniffling, shaking slightly, entire body suddenly filled with grief from head to toe. _It’s not fair, none of this is fair, why does he have to go somewhere I can’t follow?_

“You don’t have to keep this in all the time, you know,” Louis whispers, his fingers twirling Zayn’s hair.

Zayn tries to wipe at his face with his free hand, but it doesn’t really matter. He can’t stop now that he’s started.

“I know.”

“How are you feeling, hmm? How are _you_ doing?” Louis wonders, which is ridiculous because he shouldn’t have to worry about Zayn or his stupid feelings.

“I dunno,” Zayn murmurs into his shirt. He should change the subject. This might be too heavy and Lou doesn’t need this right now.

But Louis Tomlinson knows Zayn Malik better than he knows himself, has always known what Zayn needs and what’s best for him.

“I don’t just worry about you, you know,” Louis intones, his hand now rubbing up and down Zayn’s bony back. “I worry about all of you.”

Zayn’s breath hitches at the stark admission.

“I worry my mom thinks her… _genes_ did this or something,” Louis sighs. “I worry about my sisters and what they’ll do without a big brother to protect them. I worry about you too, all the time.”

Zayn sniffs, his eyes red rimmed and refusing to dry up.

“I worry you’ll feel aimless. Without me. Without the two of us out there, being idiots together.”

Zayn nods.

“But I know you’ll be okay,” Louis says with a nod, his chin knocking into Zayn’s forehead. “You’ll be just fine. You’ll go to school next year and fucking kill it. Meet some hot dude, ask him to blow you, do that one thing you did earlier that had Dillon squealing like a pig.”

Zayn elbows Louis hard in the side, scoffs an embarrassed sound, even as the two of them smirk. It was pretty good, Zayn can admit. _I’m good._

But even as Louis says it, it’s like they know it’s not enough. It’ll never be enough, not without Louis there to see it all. He was supposed to be the witness to it, to report back to Zayn’s sisters when he was acting like a selfish prick, emailing his mom to say “your son, Zayn Malik, only got a B in this class and you should really have a talk with him.” Louis loved to embarrass Zayn more than anything else, and Zayn has always sort of loved it, even if he won’t say so.

Louis continues to hold him and Zayn continues to cry. He’s been holding it in for so long, maybe it’s just best to get it out. Open the floodgates and hope for the best.

Zayn can tell Lou is too tired to keep talking much longer. His hand goes a bit slack against his hairline where he plays with the coarse hair there. And Zayn knows better than to keep him up this late, when his body is already trying to shut down, not at all helped by lack of sleep.

He should move to the window seat, to his Pillow Pet and the view of the stars.

But he can’t. He just can’t let go, not yet.

“Lou,” he ends up saying, his face twisted in anguish. “I just…”

“I know. Shhh.”

“I don’t know how to do this without you,” Zayn says through the snot and tears sliding into his mouth. “I don’t know how to do any of it.”

“You’ll figure it out, babe,” Louis whispers, his voice syrupy and thick, seconds from sleep. “You’ll be okay.”

“How do you know? How do you know, Lou? Because it doesn’t make sense, it doesn’t work, without you. I don’t want to do it alone.”

Louis hand goes slack, he’s seconds from dreaming. So Zayn shifts up a bit, tilts his head so he can stare at his friend’s serene, calm face. In those first few moments in and out of sleep, it’s like Louis somehow relaxes. His face almost curls into a smile, like everything’s fine and no one is dying. It’s Zayn’s favorite.

But before he drops under all the way, Louis wrinkles his nose and licks at his dry, cracked lips.

“S’okay, Zayn. I don’t think… this is all there is. I’ll make sure you’re okay. I’ll be there.”

He smiles serenely again, exhales a slow breath, and then his face goes slack.

Zayn hurries to close his eyes, so he doesn’t see Louis fully drift off. He’s afraid sometimes that Louis won’t wake up, that he’ll go quietly in his sleep and that’ll be the end of it. So he moves his face down into the center of Louis’s chest and holds onto his tshirt for dear life, prays and prays and prays that he wakes up in the morning and they have at least one more day.

“One. Just one, please just one more,” he whispers to himself, into the striped fabric.

 

***

 

They have two more weeks as best friends. Against all odds, against what the doctors had initially thought, Louis holds on for two more weeks. It’s hard for him, he starts to lose many of the things that make him _Louis_ , like his laugh and his gumption and the fact that he would usually make fun of every single person that walked into his room.

Never let it be said that Louis Tomlinson went without a fight.

In the end, he stays mostly unobtrusive. He stops throwing up as much, his stomach settles. The bags under his eyes aren’t as prominent, not so dark and swollen. He saves his voice for when he really needs it, as he lets his parents and sisters bicker and laugh around him, let’s Zayn read him their favorite comics, let’s the nurses fuss over him even when they shouldn’t. He smiles through all of it though, like maybe he’s accepted it. Like maybe he’s savoring the “last times” with everyone around him.

One of the last conversations they have, Louis expresses again how Zayn will make it without him. He says it all eloquent and stoic, even as Zayn cries yet again about how unfair it all was. How it wasn’t right for a child to be taken this way.

“It is what it is, and that’s all there is,” he says with set eyes and a scratchy voice. “This is all we’ve got now, so we’ll make the most of it. We’ll… talk about comics and action movies and… tits and dicks and how we’re both lucky we lost our virginities years ago.”

Zayn snorts at that.

“Don’t be a twat, and think you can’t cry. Because you can. I won’t watch. And just remember: it could be worse, I think. And we’re still here, together. You’ll find someone new to sit around and have fun with, and I’ll make sure whoever it is, is good enough. A new partners in crime.”

Zayn holds onto Louis’s hand so hard, it must hurt. But he lays his head down on their clasped fingers and lets Louis continue. It seems important, like it was something he never wanted Zayn to forget.

“So… it is what it is, Zayn,” Louis finishes, as he ruffles Zayn’s hair a bit. “We’re lucky to have gotten this far. Lucky fuckin’ ducks, we are.”

Zayn sniffs and tries to nod, his eyes swollen. But he tries to smile and accept it, to really listen to what Louis said. To hold onto it.

That was one of the last things Louis Tomlinson ever said to Zayn Malik.

And in some ways, Zayn supposes they are lucky. Some people don’t get to have that kind of close friendship, the kind that means two soul mates have found each other at long last.

Even now, sometimes he thinks that maybe they were friends in a past life, maybe they were actually brothers. Maybe in this life, in this go-around, it had to end early for Lou so he could be waiting in the next place. Maybe when Zayn passes away in his sleep, or on a boat, Louis will be the first thing he sees, to take him on to the next life. The next adventure.

Louis, with his fist held up to bump against Zayn’s, smiling like a puppy in a window. He’d probably joke about something stupid, but also sentimental. Something light, yet heartfelt. Because that’s basically the entire dichotomy of Louis Tomlinson: sour candy, with a sweet center.

Right as Zayn “crossed over” or whatever, wherever people end up when they die, Louis would ruffle his hair, sling an arm around his shoulders, and kiss his temple.

He’d say something else, too. Something that would make the entire thing worth it.

“Told you we were lucky ducks, didn’t I?” he’d say with a lazy smile, to get Zayn smiling too. “Now come on, let’s go find my Jeep.”

They’d walk into the light, maybe. And Zayn would think it thoroughly, would feel it in his bones, that they really were lucky. Zayn was lucky to know Louis and Louis was lucky that Zayn put up with him and enjoyed his stupid jokes so much.

 

***

 

  
They were quite the pair of lucky ducks, all the way until the end.

Maybe in the next life, they’ll get ducks tattooed somewhere.

Definitely _not_ on their ass cheeks.


End file.
